Altanbaatar: Armored Adventures
by FluffleNeCharka
Summary: Howard married Gene's mom and changed the course of Gene's life. So when Howard dies in a plane crash and a new villain called Iron Man appears, Gene takes up the Makluan Rings and becomes a superhero to fight him and save the day. AU.
1. Prologue

**Author's Note:** Future chapters will be longer, I promise. This is more of a backstory chapter. As a disclaimer I'd like to note I don't own anything in this fanfic and this is not being done for profit. Some chapters in the future may contain Mongolian phrases/words, since this incarnation of Gene would never have been exposed to the Chinese language in his life. All Mongolian will be translated and hopefully used correctly, but feel free to correct me if I mess up. On that note the story's name is a reference to Gene's new hero name, which roughly translates to golden hero. I felt that Mandarin was an odd name for a _Mongolian_ hero, so I changed it to something more Mongolian and less Chinese.

**Side Note/Warning:** This fanfic contains Pepperony and Gene/Whitney in future chapters. Just a heads up for those who prefer/dislike certain pairings. Oh, and in case the summary wasn't blatant enough about it, there will be evil Tony ahead. And it is awesome.

* * *

_My little sun, you light my sky, when you smile I feel the clouds come apart. Precious child, do you know that you are loved? My little sun, come let me hold you, you warm my soul. –_ Mongolian lullaby

_Experience is not what happens to a man; it is what a man does with what happens to him. – _Aldous Huxley

* * *

Narangerel was running, crying, and bleeding.

There was blood covering her pants, her coat, and her boots. Mixed in with them, barely visible in the dim glow of the street lights, were tears in the fabric and mud. Her knees were both skinned but she didn't slow in the least as she rounded a corner as fast as her long legs could take her. The seventeen year old woman tightened her grip around her son, not daring to look down or pause to comfort him. He was hungry and cold and very confused, but he was alive. That much had taken everything she had to ensure. Now both their lives depended on the kindness of a man she barely knew. This was half desperation and half insanity. Still, with nowhere else to go and no relatives in the city she simply had no other choice. Clutching her child to her, she sprinted across the street, ignoring the skidding cars and angry shouts of drivers in the early morning snowfall. She was soaked to the bone. Parts of her coat had frozen outright. Temugin was still mostly dry and warm, but he was scarcely four years old and there were limits to what his body could take.

"Howard!" she screamed, nearly hysterical. "Howard!"

Three floors up, she thought she saw a hotel room light flicker on. She didn't pause, barreling through the locked glass doors with all her strength. The shattered glass embedded itself in her right arm and she didn't even pause. Narangerel was past caring about her own health. All she cared about was her son. So long as he was alright she could care less what happened to her own body. Adrenaline and fear spurred her up the stairs three at a time, calling out for the foreign man with the kind eyes she'd come to call her friend. He was a virtual stranger but he was American and rich. He could protect them, she knew he could, and she would have kicked in his door had he not opened it just then. She stood before him, midnight black hair a wild mess, bloody and filthy, shaking with the effort of what she'd done. Weakly, Narangerel held out her son to him. Howard took Temugin and cradled him, hushing him softly and opening the door to allow the Mongolian woman to enter. She took four steps in and collapsed onto the floor, still conscious despite the tremendous pain.

"Howard," she half-whispered like a prayer as she struggled to sit up, "Take care of Temugin, please, after I'm gone. Here," she mumbled, pulling a necklace with a ring on it off her neck and holding it out to him. "This is for my son."

"Naran, calm down," Howard instructed her, handing the child to his friend. Narangerel thought she remembered Howard saying the black man was in the army. She couldn't recall his name through the blood loss and trauma of the past few days. "Tell me what happened, slowly."

"A Chinese man tried to kill me and she threw a vase at him. It hit his head." Temugin supplied, looking pleadingly at the man who held him now. "Please make my mom stay, I don't wanna be all alone!"

"You'll have Howard," Narangerel told him, struggling to use the wall to steady herself as she stood. "You will get to play with his son and go to a good school. It'll be fun." She gave Howard a pleading look. "I have to go or the Tong will find me. They were close behind us-"

"They're not going to get through the laser parameter," Howard assure her, and when the Mongolian woman gave him a look that said she didn't understand a word of that, he pressed a button on a device that looked like a remote control. Bright purple lasers coursed through the walls of the room. "Anyone who touches those will get a third degree burn. You don't have to leave Temugin to protect him. Naran, you're safe."

Her rose quartz colored eyes widened. Then she embraced Howard, wrapping her too-thin arms around his waist and burying her head in his shoulder. "Thank you, thank you so much, Howard," she murmured into the fabric of his shirt, "I don't know what I could ever do to repay you…"

He wrapped his arms around her waist as her knees buckled. "Right now, you can start by letting me treat these injuries and giving me the whole story. Rhodes, can you grab the first aid kit for me? And then maybe you should go get some breakfast for all of us."

Narangerel allowed herself to be led to a couch as Temugin looked around the suite in awe. This was bigger than their house. He began to follow the black man known as Rhodes around, looking a little intimidated by the man's height. This foreigner didn't speak Mongolian, but he was, in Temugin's own words, chocolate-colored and super tough. Temugin kept three steps behind him at all times. His mother smiled, exhausted.

"I think you have a new fan," she said in English, gesturing towards her son.

David Rhodes smiled down at the little Mongolian boy, who was curiously poking at the man's shoes. "They're so cute at this age. I got a son back home who's four and a half, although he's shorter than your kid." He handed the first aid kit to Howard. "Anything you want in particular to eat?" She shook her head, and he turned to go, pausing only at the door when a thought occurred to him. "Miss Narangerel, how old are you?"

"Seventeen."

"And how old is your son?"

"Four."

His eyes widened. "Oh."

And although he didn't say anything else, there was a kind of compassion in his eyes now that crossed the language barrier. It was the cross-parent compassion, that pity for those in a harder situation than them with the same amount of children. Narangerel understood it well. Foreigners did not have children until later on, and even in her home country she had been the object of scorn for her actions. Though many had simply mocked her poor farmer of a husband, and informed her she could do far better socially, there had been no shortage of sneering people calling her a child. They had said she did not know what she was getting into. Perhaps they were right, but her love had blinded her and she'd thought that surely she would be able to make it with Nergui by her side. Maybe, some defiant part of her said, they would have. She'd never know, not her husband struck dead by the Tong. Before she hadn't understood why they'd gone after a simple farmer and his family. Now she understood they were after the Rings… and worse yet, Temugin. The murder of a good, hard working, soft spoken young man was nothing to them. They were monsters.

Thankfully, some twist of fate had brought her young son into a friendship with another little boy, a brunette with white skin who liked to get into mischief. Apparently this was enough for them to bridge the language barrier, although not enough to get them out of trouble. Narangerel still remembered the police officer holding one boy under each arm, his head covered in honey and a screwdriver sticking out of his left ear, asking her if this was her son. Temugin had claimed it was Tony's idea. Tony claimed the opposite. The two parents had talked it over and decided it was probably a dual effort to cause this much trouble. Despite the difference in class between the two of them, parenting was a universal uniting factor.

She'd never thought that friendship would save her life. And yet here they were, Temugin severely shaken and terrified yet very much alive, making a fort out of couch cushions in Howard Stark's hotel suite. It was like something out of a very odd dream, the only reassurance this was real the aching of her battered and winded body. Exhausted but finally safe, she fell asleep within moments of Howard wrapping the last of her cuts, sprawled across the couch without pillows or blankets. The American smiled, leaving the room briefly to return with a thick comforter that he laid atop her sleeping form. Temugin poked his head out of the fort to ask if his mother needed a pillow. Howard shook his head no and supervised the fort's continued instruction with a fond smile on his face as the first hints of dawn began to show over the mountain tops. Tomorrow was still uncertain, and he wasn't sure what the future held.

But everyone was alive and safe, and that was enough for right now.


	2. Gold Forged In Combat Part One

**Author's Note:** I'm torn between Gene/Whitney and Rhodey/Whitney. Writing both would get very complicated very quickly, but I'm having a hard time choosing. Thoughts, my readers?

Also I changed the summary because since Gene and Tony's roles are switched, this means he thinks Howard is dead right now. Oh, the angst.

* * *

_The greatest minds are capable of the greatest vices as well as of the greatest virtues.__ – _Rene Descartes

_Murder. It's only one word, but it can change everything so permanently that you will never be the same so long as you live. _– Dexter Morgan, from a fanfic for Showtime's Dexter

* * *

No matter how many times Gene told his mother not to, she took great relish in calling him Timmy.

It came from a nickname Happy Hogan had bestowed on the Mongolian boy back in kindergarten. More accurately, the bigger (and dumber, Gene would like to add) boy couldn't say Temugin correctly, so he called him Timmy Gene. Imagine the boy's horror when his mother endorsed the nickname fully and began working it into every possible conversation. She thought it was adorable. Gene thought it was humiliating, especially when she said it in front of his classmates. Although he was fairly good at maintaining a bored neutral expression in the throes of any emotion, nothing made him turn red faster than that nickname. Not from bullies – oh, he'd have been bullied into oblivion if that were true. His mother just seemed to have a strange power over him. If she wanted something done she simply had to give him a pleading look with her rose-quartz eyes, and if she wanted to punish him she knew all his most hated foods to give him for dinner. If she wanted to embarrass him, Timmy was a great way to do it in under three syllables.

"It could be worse," Rhodey had noted once. "After all, she could've named you something hard to pronounce. Well, hard_er_."

"You and Tony don't have any problem saying Temugin."

"We have freakishly smart parents," Rhodey had shot back with a smile. "And being nerds helps."

Not that Gene would ever call Rhodey a nerd next to Tony. Anthony Stark was, in Gene's words, the patron saint of all nerds. He had long ago decided on homeschooling. More honestly he was too smart for even the most advanced schools to handle. Gene couldn't help but feel awed by his adopted brother. He'd never met anyone smarter and secretly held the opinion that Tony was even more brilliant than Howard was. Tony could build machines out of spare parts that outdid Gene's best attempts any day of the week; it was his gift. He was incredible when it came to technology and was by all accounts just like Howard at that age. Not that Gene was jealous of him, or at least, not that he'd ever _admit_ he was jealous of Tony.

Gene was told by his mother that he took after his biological father. He barely remembered the man, and had spent countless nights plagued by nightmares of the young man's death. Temugin remembered that much, the blood and pain left by the gunshot wound. He remembered dark gray eyes and a soft voice whispering that it would be okay. It wasn't, not until they'd met Howard and life had gotten stabilized once more. But Gene's father left a legacy of kindness and good acts behind him. He had been the kind of man who'd take in many a poor and down on their luck neighbor, neighbor being meant in the Mongolian sense of the word rather than the American one. If you were human, you were his concern. Gene thought that his biological father would've gotten along quite well with his step father.

Howard. Gene had been scared of him at first, when he was small and didn't understand what was happening. He hadn't liked the foreigner with his thickly accented Mongolian and soft voice. He much preferred following David Rhodes around. He was convinced David could protect them from all the bad people who were chasing them, because David was big and tough. It was only a month after they'd moved to the US when Gene slowly began to comprehend the situation on a child's level. Howard had been the one who really saved them. The evil men who'd tried to hurt them wouldn't be able to follow them out of the country. Not for a ring with powers most of them didn't believe in. Howard had taken them to a place with lots of strange food and way too many people, but it was safe and the man loved Narangerel. Temugin knew it even before Howard did. They looked at each other like married people. And nobody who had lovey-dovey eyes like that could be bad. The Chinese man who had tried to kill his mother had eyes that were empty and cruel. Temugin had known he was bad at a glance. Howard, though, could be trusted. Nobody did all this for someone he didn't care about.

This brings us full circle to Timmy, the world's worst nickname. Gene winced internally as he heard Howard calling him to breakfast. Breakfast at the Stark household was just plain weird. Either Narangerel would wake up early and there would be a full on buffet of Western breakfast foods or she'd sleep in and Howard would have what he and Tony referred to as 'the best breakfast ever'. This was code for scrambled eggs slathered in ketchup, mashed potatoes and gravy and chocolate chip waffles with bacon bits on top. All of this was mixed together and consumed with two forks each. Gene never could quite understand how either of them stomached it. The very thought of eating all of this on the same plate made his stomach twist inside him. Thankfully he was not alone in his dislike of scrambled eggs and mashed potato mixed together; he could always count on there being some toast in the house that he could make and eat inbetween getting dressed and packed. Narangerel knew her son well enough to keep an emergency breakfast backup plan - bread, in other words - in the house. Today's selection was blackberry or strawberry jam. Oh, the joys of being rich, he thought to himself as he recalled two kids swearing the Starks ate roast pheasant every morning.

"Timmy, that's not a healthy breakfast," Howard noted with due concern.

"Says the man who's eating high salt content ketchup on top of full-cholesterol eggs," Gene shot back, rolling his eyes. "Didn't Mom's lecture the last time you ate this stuff sink in at all?"

Tony snorted into his drink, which, Gene noticed, was an orange soda. Oh, so healthy. "A little indulgence once in a while isn't gonna kill us."

"Then a little non-indulgence once in a while won't kill me." Gene looked at his father with a smirk. "If you're worried, why don't you go play the harp for a bit and calm down?"

Tony burst out into laughter and promptly choked on his drink. The brothers had found in the attic of the house pictures of their father circa high school. He was in the orchestra… as a solo harp player. The year after that saw him master the rain stick, an instrument that was, if anything, even fruitier than the harp. Howard turned red and stared at his eggs as if they had brought this upon him. Truthfully it wasn't even that Tony and Gene found the harp to be inherently funny. It was Howard's terrified reaction to them threatening to tell other people. Some CEOs had bribery and murder in their past. Some had sick and twisted fetishes. Howard Stark had the harp and the even more shameful rain stick. _No man's rich enough to buy back his past,_ Gene thought as he started to exit the room, only to be stopped by Howard.

"Gene, I need you to come with me on a business trip."

Gene shot his father a look that suggested he'd just lapsed into an unintelligible foreign tongue. "Take Tony. He's the smart one, not to mention the one who's not in school."

"Well, yes, but…" Howard sighed, rubbing the back of his neck. He and Tony did it without ever realizing how similar it made them look. "I just don't want you to go your whole life without ever getting a close up look at work. You're at that age where you're going to pick a career soon, and I want to know that you considered all your options carefully. And-"

"Alright, alright." Gene rolled his eyes and pulled out his cell phone. "I'm just going to tell Rhodes I won't be there today and then we can go get our nerd on. Hopefully Tony won't invent anything too world changing while we're gone. I'd hate to miss the second coming of the Super Toaster."

"Blow up a kitchen one time and you never live it down," the brunette boy protested loudly as his father chuckled. "Oh, yeah, if I talk about the harp you get mad, but you two just can't let the toaster go, can you? Look, we rebuilt the lab and the police dropped the charges-"

"Only because most of the evidence was vaporized or coated in butter," Gene muttered as he texted his friend. "Heck, we couldn't even find any remains of Super Toaster Mark One itself in the chaos. How long did it take for the dust cloud to clear again? Wasn't it three days?"

"It was two and you know it!" Tony shot back, and Howard held up his hands for peace.

"Please, you two, I don't need this at eight in the morning. Tony, finish your breakfast. Gene, you're with me." Howard took his adopted son by the arm before the sixteen year olds could bicker any further with each other. "I swear, you two _enjoy_ fighting. It's like you both get high off of pettiness or something."

"A harp player _would_ know a lot about getting high, huh? Since that's the only non-gay reason to play it, I mean."

Howard turned tomato-colored as they made their way to the elevator, Tony and Gene's dual snickering echoing in the halls.

"Tony's invention is going to save lives," Howard was saying as Gene gazed out the window, looking bored. The white man paused, sighing. "You didn't catch a word of that, did you?"

In truth, yes, yes he had. He'd caught the entire long spiel on how Tony was great and inventors were awesome. For about the hundredth time in his life Gene was reminded that he was not and never could be Howard's real son. He wasn't an inventor and a genius like Tony. He wasn't smart like Tony nor was he capable of creating an exosuit, whatever that was. Howard hadn't explained it very well other than to gush about the power it had to rescue people and save lives. Suddenly making the honor roll felt like it was no accomplishment at all. Gene was forever standing in the shadow of his sibling, who was better than he could ever be without ever trying. And some part of him wanted to scream in frustration that he couldn't be held to Tony's standards and he had no interest in inventing and he was doing his best, damn it. But he knew better than to say that. It would hurt Howard's feelings and Gene wasn't a confrontational person. He was more of the quiet yet snarky type, as Rhodes would say. It was better just to fake boredom and obliviousness. This was how he got through a lot of life, actually.

"I heard something about suits," Gene volunteered helpfully, causing Howard to roll his eyes. "Look, Dad, this is Tony's thing. He'd flip if he could see all this new stuff you've been working on. He's the one who should be here; he'd be in heaven if he saw the new lab you're opening."

"But he wouldn't quite appreciate this," Howard smiled softly, pulling out – Gene did a double take – a Makluan Ring. Gene let out an audible gasp. "I've been doing some research, and the legends your mother had heard about your family seem to be true. There are really five Rings. The technology inside them is astounding."

"It's magic," Gene corrected.

"Not you too," Howard muttered, then shook his head. "Whatever they are, they only work in the presence of you and your mother. And she doesn't want me studying them because she's convinced that they're magical."

"They _are_. Which means studying them is going to be fundamentally impossible because magic likes to screw over the laws of physics and science pretty thoroughly, then set common sense on fire on its way out. Trying to understand it in science terminology would take a lot of translating magical terms into phrases you can understand. I'm not saying I'm not going to help you out, but this is going to be really hard if not outright impossible," Gene explained. He paused. "Didn't my mother explain the Rings to you?"

"Well… she explained more in a 'you're committing a grave sacrilege against the forces of magic' kind of way," Howard explained, shifting in his seat uneasily.

"Oh, you are. But any sane god is probably pretty fond of you at this point, considering your inventions have stopped wars and saved the entire country of Wakanda." Gene thought back to what his mother had taught him. "The intent of the person studying magic matters. You're the kind of guy who'd use the teleportation ability to rescue people in collapsed mines or something like that. So I think it'll be okay unless you try to use this stuff to hurt people."

Just then, there was a loud thud from the front of the plane, causing both men to turn and stare. Shakily, the pilot called back for Howard to come forward. Gene felt his heart catch in his throat at the idea that there could be something truly wrong, but his father smiled like it was nothing, handed him the Ring he'd discovered recently and walked toward the front cabin. Sliding the Ring onto his hand beside the other, original one his mother had given him, Gene thought he felt them both glow faintly and hum at each other. He'd never been able to see much point in being the Mandarin when that would just make the Tong come after his family. Still, it was his duty to keep the super powered objects on him at all times. He looked up, in the direction his father had gone, and bit his lip. He thought he heard voices, one more than there should be, in the cockpit up ahead.

And then there was some kind of explosion.

Everything didn't go black like in the movies, but Gene vaguely recalled that at this altitude he wasn't going to be able to stay conscious for very long. No time to recall the exact length he had to work with, he had to save his father. He couldn't see anything with the wind rushing past him so quickly, couldn't even hear the plane explode. He felt it, waves of heat and shrapnel falling from the sky. Gene thought he might've screamed as some of it pierced him like white hot knives. He felt the Rings on his hand glow with magic. Then he was on the ground, the impact dulled by teleportation but still painful through the black armor now engulfing him. Unthinking and a hair's breadth away from consciousness, he desperately told the Rings to get him home. Then everything was engulfed in the white energy of teleportation, and he fell again. He thought he heard familiar voices, and someone calling his name. Unfortunately, this time it _was_ fading to black, and all he could do was shake as the armor withdrew into the Rings, leaving him sprawled on the living room floor.

"Narangerel Stark is still missing, authorities in the United States say. The Mongolian woman was last seen outside her home gardening-"

"-blood stains at the crash site match Howard Stark's, according to the official FBI investigation. He is presumed dead-"

"-recently been named the new head of Stark International-"

Gene flipped through the channels, trying to find something. Some clue, there had to be some reason for this. There had to be something he was missing. He was descended from generations of warriors and strategists, why couldn't he figure this out? The only logical theory he could come up with was Stane being behind this. That meant someone who had been Howard's friend for nearly twenty years had stabbed him in the back and that didn't make sense. There were dozens of less public, more accidental ways he could've done it. Besides, if it was Stane then that meant that no one could be trusted, not even the people closest to him, and Gene wasn't ready to face that idea just yet. _This should not be happening,_ Gene thought for the hundredth time that month. _This should not be happening._

"Hey man," Rhodey said softly, pushing open the door to their room. He'd gladly said he'd room with either Stark boy, given the circumstances. Tony had become so moody and angry after what happened that he'd opted for the spare room, where he could often be heard cursing or kicking things in frustration. "I got you something to eat. You've been at this for a while."

"Not hungry," the Asian boy replied, not glancing up. His hair had grown significantly in the two months since his parents had been taken from him, and he hadn't bothered to cut it or bathe in a while. He had never been a big eater, and in the wake of this recent trauma he was doing good to get a meal in per day. "Busy."

Rhodey sighed, grabbing the remote from him and turning off the TV. "You need to eat, Gene. I know you and Tony have both been through a lot lately, but that doesn't mean you should let yourselves go like this. Do you think your dad would've wanted you to starve yourself to death?"

Silently, the adopted Stark sibling took the tray of food from his friend, looking remarkably downtrodden. He and Tony had both gotten that look permanently attached to their faces after Stane had been declared the new head of their father's company. Tony was utterly furious; Gene was crestfallen. Both were more or less withdrawing from the world in their own way. Rhodey felt more and more worried with every passing day. On the bright side, though, soon Gene would be well enough to start attending school again, which meant he'd no longer be sulking around the house hunting down conspiracy theories on the internet about what happened to his parents. Tony had already begun (despite his protests) going to Tomorrow Academy with Rhodey, where he'd managed to form a very weird friendship with some girl he thought was cute. Gene hadn't really been listening, wondering to himself how someone who'd just lost his father and the only real mother he'd ever had could just go about his day like everything was normal. Some part of the Mongolian boy simply felt that nothing right now mattered very much. Mundane things like eating and making friends seemed a million miles removed from his life.

He'd had a teleportation device and he hadn't been able to save his own father. He had the most powerful magical artifact on the planet and he hadn't been able to think clearly enough to save the person who'd saved his life. Howard had taken them in and raised Gene and in the end the Mongolian boy had let him down. He was a failure. He didn't even taste the food he forced himself to eat, not meeting Rhodey's eyes as they sat in silence. Rhodey had always been closest to Tony. That didn't mean he didn't care about Gene or that he wasn't worried. Gene could see it on the black boy's face. Gene wished he could just tell Rhodey everything, how he hadn't even thought about Howard and how sick to his stomach he was at the thought of what a horrible person he was. _Selfish,_ he thought, the word he was looking for was selfish. No one else had even crossed his mind in the chaos.

He felt Rhodey's hand on his shoulder, and was startled out of his train of thought. "It'll be okay, man," Rhodey said softly. "Look, if you ever wanna talk, I'm right here, okay? Don't just shut down on me. I can't help you or Tony if you both get all secretive on me."

"I don't have any secrets, just nightmares," Gene shot back dryly, with a hint of his normal snarky tone back in his voice. "But thanks, Rhodes. For everything."

And somehow, he managed something close to a smile for the first time in what seemed like forever.

Tony was livid about Stane's promotion.

Gene was lost in thought, headphones on so as to avoid talking to anyone on the way to school. He'd been doing that a lot lately, Rhodey had noticed. If he retreated behind music no one would ask him how he was doing or if he was okay. Tony barely noticed. He was furious with this turn of events. Obadiah Stane was a dirty businessman, an abusive father and a jerk. He'd probably either wreck the company or make it into something Howard had never wanted: a weapons company. Rhodey listened with the knowledge that Tony was probably right eating away at his optimism more and more with every moment. Gene acted like he was in his own little world. He wasn't himself since it had all gone done. Rhodey missed the insults and constant snarky commentary more than he's thought he would. At least he'd gotten both the inventor brother and the depressed one to bathe before going to school; both of them were apt to go to school in the same clothes twice in a row with unwashed hair if he let them, even if nagging them earned him the nickname Mom.

"Tony! Rhodey!" A redhead with bright beige-gray eyes called out to them. "You'll never guess what I got off of my dad's computer this morning!"

The Mongolian boy pulled off his headphones out of respect for the school's no MP3 player policy and caught the last half of that sentence. This must've been the girl Tony was friends with. He vaguely recalled Rhodey telling him that he'd met her in eighth grade during the Tomorrow Academy entrance exams. Her hair was atomic orange like the hair dye of the same name, but natural, as much of a paradox as that was. Gene wondered how anyone could manage to be so perky at this hour of the day and if she was a coffee drinker. That would explain the excited look on her face and the bounce in her step as she ran over to them.

"Tony! I found out something your father-" She paused, catching sight of Gene. "What's he doing here?" she asked bluntly, addressing Tony and Rhodey instead of Gene directly. "Isn't this private stuff? You know, family only?"

"Gene Stark, thanks for asking, and it's nice to meet you too," he shot back, tone dark and sarcastic. "And why, yes, thank you for implying I shouldn't be told about my missing and possibly murdered parents. I really appreciate the statement that I'm not a member of my own family just because some spiky haired butch girl in men's boots says so."

"Why you-" she paused mid sentence. "Oh, whoops, I didn't realize you were… I'm sorry, I thought… you two don't look anything alike… Um, this is awkward." She regained an angry glint in her eyes. "But that's no excuse for making fun of my outfit and calling me butch!"

"And being butch is no excuse for _wearing_ that outfit, so we're even," the Asian retorted coldly, eyeing her with disdain. "So are you going to tell us what you found out, or do I still not count as family despite living under Howard's roof for fourteen years?"

"Gene, I know you've never had impeccable social skills, but lay off her," Rhodey said with noticeable exasperation in his voice. "Good lord, you've been such a jerk ever since the accident-"

"It wasn't an accident!" Tony, Gene and the girl all snapped at once. They gave each other surprised looks, Gene raising his eyebrows while Tony's eyes narrowed considerably and the redhead blinked.

"Well, at least we agree on something," the fire-headed girl smiled warmly at Gene. "Sorry for being a little insensitive. It's the moccachino talking, I swear. And I've been up all night working on getting past my dad's new encryption codes to get at the data, so I'm a little off. But it's totally worth it! I got one of the best leads we've had since the accident!" She was practically squealing with excitement. "We're gonna crack this soon, I just know it!"

Her optimism was practically tangible. Gene felt awed and a little frightened of this incredibly energetic creature. If the looks on Rhodey and Tony's faces were any indication this was just how she was, coffee or not, and he wondered if maybe, just maybe, she might really be able to help. Something akin to cautious hope sparked within him. It was best not to put too much stock in any given theory in case it fell through, yet she had FBI insider information and a smile like the sun. Some part of him he'd thought had died in the crash said that yes, maybe this could be work out. He held out a hand to her, smile gentlemanly like his mother had taught him.

"We got off on the wrong foot. I'm Temugin Khan, aka Gene. And you are?"

She hugged him cheerfully. "Pepper Potts, and welcome to Team Heroes!" She practically cheered.

He glanced over at his amused friend and sibling and sighed heavily. This just might be his ticket to unraveling the mystery of what happened, if this didn't kill him first. His patience was already wearing thin, it was unreasonably hot for early October, and a girl with more energy than a truckload of Pixie Sticks was his only hope. He could feel himself getting exhausted already.

_This is going to be a long day…_


	3. Gold Forged In Combat Part Two

**Author's Note:** My Mongolian may be way off grammatically when it gets used and I'm aware that some of the names that pop up later in this fic may be a little dated, but in my defense this stuff is hard to research. All references to Mongolian pop, hip hop, etc. may be spelled incorrectly due to the language barrier involved in translating. I take full blame for the inevitable mistakes that are about to occur.

* * *

_He who does not punish evil, commands it to be done._ — Leonardo da Vinci

_If you don't stand for something, you will fall for something_. - African proverb

* * *

Gene never had been the kind of guy to play hero.

He wasn't someone who would stand up for a bullied classmate or start a fight with a corrupt hall monitor. He had only just barely convinced his father to let him go to a nice normal public school as it was, the last thing he needed was to draw attention to himself. As cliché as it was, he wanted to be normal and that desire overrode a lot of his nobler instincts. His only desire was to be happy. Happiness to him wasn't a fancy private school and a mansion; it was talking with friends, hanging out, playing basketball and eating good food. He had been a simpler person before the so called accident had torn apart his life. His old friends promptly stopped talking to him and started talking to reporters. In a heartbeat he was tossed aside like he meant nothing. All normalcy was shattered in a few seconds of fire and metal.

Temugin Khan would spend the rest of his life using a combination of magic and technology just to walk, to keep his now worthless from the knees down legs moving. It took ultra high, ugly boots of Tony's invention just to keep him going and it took every healing spell Gene knew to keep the white hot pain at bay. Over the period of time since the crash he'd learned to make it look like he wasn't in pain, like he was just a normal person in odd footwear, but truthfully it was torture just to get out of bed. Not that he'd let anyone see that, not Gene Stark the tough guy. He was used to be treated like a cool kid and cool kids didn't need help to walk or keep their balance or, most humiliatingly of all, climb stairs. No matter how much his shattered and barely mended bones protested, the shrapnel having weakened them forever, he kept pushing himself forward. He didn't know how to be weak or ask for help, didn't know how to tell anyone he was hurt, so he simply didn't.

Tony and Rhodey had their suspicions that his condition wasn't as good as he'd been saying it was. He responded as Gene Stark always did, by ignoring it entirely. Nomin Talst's _Egshiglent Ouytan Nas Jargalta_ was playing on his wireless headphones, one of Tony's better inventions that Gene was using to keep himself from going crazy in Science class. Tony and the teacher were talking about some advanced concept that was neither related to the curriculum or interesting in any way. Fine by Gene, since he had Pepper's information to process and mull over. The romantic duo of voices in his ears changed, replaced with Altan Urag's _Ijii Mongol_. Letting the sharp flute and familiar drums wash over him, he began scribbling furiously in his notebook. Gene had, by this point, filled the better half of a four subject notebook working on his theories on what happened. It was no accident and they all knew it from the beginning.

The internet was abuzz with rumors. More importantly, there were photos taken by the phone cameras of passengers of a cruise ship that had been extremely close to the crash. This was Gene's obsession. There was something very wrong with the video feed and the pictures he was seeing. Not his own falling body or it vanishing, which barely counted since he'd just teleported to the ground for a safe landing before rolling out of sight. No, what was wrong was the air in the pictures, which glimmered and flashed like something metal was there, half concealed but ever present as it flew away. From the poor quality of the photos there was nothing he could determine from it in and of itself – this was where the internet had come in. Turns out that invisibility cloaks were an experimental technology, faulty, expensive, imperfect and not able to cover something as big as a person who moved too fast. At the needed speed to catch up and board the plane theoretically no invisibility technology should've been functional at all.

"But a few months ago, Stark International employees started noticing that materials were going missing," Pepper had explained just this morning, the sun catching her hair and making it a glowing, fiery halo around her heart shaped face. "All of these things could be used to make a cloaking device powerful enough to cloak a full grown human, provided you had a power source that wouldn't fail. Not that that exists that we know of, but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist that we don't know of. Um, did that make sense?"

"Absolutely," Gene had said, in a solemn voice that drew all eyes to him. "And that means someone sank several months of planning, theft, and at least a few million dollars into a murder when a simple bomb could've sufficed. The question is, why?"

There were no answers for that. He was at work on that at present, drawing on his memories. He'd heard voices. The assassin hadn't just killed Howard, he'd tried to talk to him. He wanted something, something that was worth the effort and money he'd put into this. What was it? Money? No, that would've been easier to obtain. A plane was no place to demand a ransom or death. So why would someone do something so very deliberate, carefully planned, and stupid? It was a waste of resources unless there was something he was getting out of it. What could Howard Stark possibly be able to give a man that was worth this insane plan? Resources, obscure metals, maybe the things in the vault at the company… There were too many options and nothing that could be easily nailed down as a sure fire answer.

Worse yet was the grim knowledge that Howard had refused to do whatever it was. His nobility had cost him his life. His refusal to sell out had killed him, and his own son had been unable to stop it. Gene shut off his music, suddenly no longer in the mood for anything pop and upbeat. The sunlight streamed in through the windows and kids were chatting, yet he felt completely detached from everything around him, as if the world wasn't real. All that was real was the feel of hot metal piercing his legs and agony so intense he couldn't scream, couldn't even breathe as it overtook his senses. Now he was trapped in a broken body that didn't feel like his own. His parents were dead and missing, maybe both gone forever. And the teacher was talking about triple recessive genetic disorders like it mattered. Like anything mattered. Gene slowly closed his notebook. Unable to find any logic in the events that had ruined his life and unable to focus on the reality all around him, he did what any responsible, well mannered young man would do.

"Can I be excused to go to the bathroom?"

He ditched school.

The teacher must've been supremely stupid not to notice Gene shouldering his messenger bag as he stepped out of the room and into the abandoned hallway. He made his way down the hall without being seen, slipping out of a back door unnoticed. With brilliant and amazing Tony the prodigy Stark in the room Gene was as good as invisible. Strangely enough, he liked that right now. He didn't need anyone asking him how he was doing when he didn't even know the answer to that himself. Thinking of everything and nothing at once, Gene had every intention of getting a hot dog and going home to rest his already aching legs when less than a block from the hot dog stand there was an explosion up ahead. He'd been within a minute and a half of a bus stop that would've taken him within four minutes of Roberta's house and bed, blessed, warm and pain free bed. Groaning, he turned toward the wafting smoke. A few months ago he'd have run home instead. A few months ago he'd have never dreamed of trying to help out in a crisis with the power of the Rings. A few months ago he wouldn't have cared if these people were hurt or not.

A few months ago was a lifetime away from the here and now. There were people on the street, children and mothers and grandfathers, _families,_ and he couldn't let their lives shatter like his. Gene ducked into an alley, letting the familiar light change him into the intimidating form of the Mandarin. He leapt into the fray and immediately regretted it when he saw the man in front of him. He was in armor. He was robbing a shipment of psitanium, a radioactive nightmarish substance that no one should ever be exposed to for longer than twenty seconds. And he was the one who had killed Howard Stark. The red and gold in the photos perfectly matched the red and gold in front of him, the exact shades of metal alloy. Gene felt fear clutch his heart. Someone who murdered someone like that wouldn't hesitate to take out any civilian or cop that got in his way. Before he even knew what he was doing, anger and righteous fury overtook he raised his hand and blasted the man in the back hard enough to knock him off his feet and into a wall.

This was a spectacularly bad idea. No plan, no real idea of what his own powers were and an intimidating, powerful opponent ahead of him. Yes, Gene would've been terrified had he given any thought to this moment whatsoever. Instead he was busy shouting at people to move, get away now, run like crazy. They did, given the chance, and thankfully the assassin didn't seem to be interested in going after the screaming innocents. The bad news was he was after psitanium, which was more dangerous than any gun. Apparently this guy was strong enough that his plan was to lift the truck and cart it away. _Oh, yeah, like I'm letting _that_ happen?_ Gene thought, gritting his teeth. _Time for another bad idea, this one brought to you by the letter t._

T for teleport, that was. Lifting the truck and getting it to a rooftop was Gene's only solution to the problem. A wise man would've then teleported away from his opponent instead of back to him, but Temugin Stark had never been accused of being wise. Reckless, badass, stupid, headstrong – these were words that might be applied to him as he leapt at the unsuspecting metal man, hands locking around the assassin's neck. This man had just endangered the lives of everyone in NYC. The loss of his parents was still a fresh wound. Gene wasn't just furious, he was so angry he could feel his own heartbeat in his head and everything had a red tint to it. Without much aplomb or snark he began to try to rip the helmet off the smug jerk who'd ruined his life, because once he knew who this man was he was going to make a media circus out of him, shame his family for generations and beat him unconscious all in the same day.

A blast of energy to the chest knocked this plan and all ability to breathe out of Gene, as he slammed into a building hard enough to leave a Mandarin shaped imprint in the mortar. The red and gold armored man flew up to him and said in a voice rendered barely comprehensible by technology, "Look, pal, I don't know who you are, but I don't have time for some dark and edgy super hero wannabe. So you can leave, and I can play nice, or we can do this the hard way."

Gene responded by teleporting behind him, landing on him and holding the man's head so it bore the full impact of the ground. That, the Mongolian reflected privately, was extremely satisfying in ways Rhodey never needed to know about. His opponent kicked at him, but Gene was already on the other side of him readying the energy blast to end all blasts. Again, this was a moment where planning might've saved him a lot of headaches, as this particular genre savvy villain had come up with a way to deflect the beam off of his arm. It hit Gene with an alarming hiss and sizzle as the metal bent and gave way. As fear battled with anger in his head, the other man's blasters hit him in the same spot, slamming him back into a building – and it said something about the severity of the situation that Gene didn't even notice that through the fiery pain that was beginning to engulf him as his armor gave way. He was going to die and this madman was going to probably end up killing people with the psitanium and Gene had, for the second time in his life, had super powers and been incapable of stopping anything. _Useless!_ He screamed at himself as the metal suit's internal temperature began to rise to dangerous levels. _I'm useless! I couldn't save my dad and now I can't save anyone else!_

"Is that what you want, Temugin?_"_ A soft voice asked in his head. "To save the world?"

"I have to try. All these people… no one should have to go through what happened to me… life's hard enough as it is… I have to try… can't let this happen…" He was losing consciousness and the enemy was flying as he watched, helpless and immobile. "Tuslaarai…"

The single Mongolian word seemed to unlock something within, and it was all Gene could do not to scream as golden light appeared and spiraled around him, ribbons of light and color forming a dome around him as the black armor faded away. He stood before something his rational mind did not understand, a spiritual presence that left him breathless and unable to move. He breathed it in and felt the burned skin knit itself back together, and though his legs remained the same the fact that he wasn't dead was a miracle in and of itself. The blasts he'd endured should have cooked him alive inside his own armor. Inside he was in the center of something powerful and ancient, a voice, a series of voices calling out to him. He reached out tentatively. His fingers brushed the golden vortex and the light swirled up his arms, down his legs, across his torso and he barely even felt it. Everything was warm. Everything was undeniably _right._ He heard a voice call out to him, telling him that he was worthy, and then everything flashed unbearably bright white.

"Make good on your pledge, Temugin," a voice whispered in his ear. "The battle is not lost."

He looked down at his white gloved hand, flexing experimentally and feeling the power course through him, and for the first time since his father died, he felt hopeful. Triumphant, even.

The battle was lost, but the war was still on.

* * *

James Rhodes was not having a good day.

His best friend was getting an ego trip out of correcting the science teacher for the umpteenth time, his other best friend had just bolted, and his other, female best friend was fueling on the second's paranoia. Things weren't exactly going as planned. Pepper and Gene went from barely tolerating each other – which was a natural by-product of getting too smart mouthed, hot headed people together – and hanging on each other's every word. Gene wasn't doing as well with this whole thing as he said he was. He was just as obsessed as he was the day he woke up and found his world turned upside down. Rhodey didn't blame him. He just wished that he'd let him in on what he was thinking. He was starting to get sick of both of the Starks blocking him out.

Take right now, for instance. Tony was trying so hard to act normal that it was painfully obvious he wasn't okay. If he was okay he'd be tinkering on some invention and paying no attention to class whatsoever… and he'd still know all the answers so long as it was science or math. Of course, Tony's anger over the whole thing had to find an exit of some sort, and his reaction to Stane taking over Stark International was just all his pain fired at one thing. It was easier to hate Stane than to mourn Howard or worry for Narangerel. That way he didn't have to focus on the things that were beyond his control, the things in his life he couldn't fix. Rhodey hated watching the two boys slowly break down from all of this. Tony had been in such shock the afternoon after it happened he'd just stared ahead blankly, like everything in him had shut down. Gene had begun to shake his head no before launching into hysterical denial. Currently they were both in varying stages of the grieving process. Rhodey just hoped neither of them did anything stupid or dangerous because of it.

Cue a green haired student from the Politics and Economy class next door bursting in and screaming, "You've GOT to see this! You will not believe what's going on downtown!"

Rhodey, feeling his stomach twist painfully, wondered what was going wrong this time. The teacher vainly tried to get them back into the classroom, shouting about detention and school standards. Unfortunately for any chance of peace being obtained he also had a crush on the teacher of the P&E class, Ms. Asaji, and so his protests died on his lips as the brunette woman gave him a small smile. Groaning at how stupid the adults were, Rhodey pushed his way forward through the too crowded classroom and stood on a desk to push the volume up on the TV sitting in the corner of the room. The volume raised enough to silence the whining kids in the back, he stepped down, stepped back, took one look at the screen and nearly fainted where he stood.

Most people do not have sufficient knowledge of Mongolia to recognize their clothing at a glance. If Gene and Narangerel were to be believed, most people were sufficiently stupid in America to not know Mongolia was still a country or tell Asia countries apart. Rhodey, however, was a history nerd. He was a culture nerd. He was, on occasion, even a language nerd. He may not have had Tony's freakish amounts of scientific genius or the ability to make a toaster take out a whole city block (Super Toaster, may he rest in peace) but he knew Mongolian clothing when he saw it. And even in New York City the odds of there being multiple Mongolian super heroes with glowing rings were low to none. Rhodey stared up at the screen like it was displaying an unearthly horror as he fought the urge to hyperventilate. _Gene…_

The Mongolian boy was in a _deel_, a long robe that was tied at the waist with a sash that wrapped around his waist six or seven times. This particular deel, however, was old fashioned like the ones Rhodey had seen in history books, with a tall collar, thick fabric and a hood, something that hadn't been in usage in Mongolia for a very long time now. It was white with gold trim on the sleeves and bottom hem, and the sash was gold, too. Underneath his hood the Mongolian boy had some kind of white cloth over his mouth and nose, hiding his eyes under a golden mask. Rhodey wouldn't even have recognized him had it not been for the Rings.

There was a red and gold armored suit trying to steal psitanium. The pulsating purple mineral seemed to suck all light out from around it as the white and gold clad Gene teleported in front of it, defending it from the would be thief. Over the chatter of students Rhodey heard what sounded like a deeper version of Gene's voice say that this was going to a hospital to be used properly. The man in armor snorted and shot back something about Gene being noble that incited most of the class to get angry. Somewhere in the back Happy yelled out, "Boo! Kick his ass!" Ms. Asaji promptly told him not to swear, even as she clenched the papers she was holding even tighter to herself. Psitanium was the only known cure for several strains of cancer. Her blood boiled at the thought of the people who would die if this was stolen.

Gene's new robe was, to Rhodey's amazement, apparently laser proof. Since this defied a lot of basic scientific rules and facts (not to mention common sense), the armored man was caught off guard as Gene blasted him in the chest, the white beam knocking him off his feet entirely. Teleporting behind him as the red and gold man stood up, the white clad superhero didn't hesitate to blast him from behind and send him flying. "That's cheating!" someone to Rhodey's right yelled at the same time Ms. Asaji yelled, "That was awesome!" Rhodey barely heard their commentary, absorbed in the way the laser blasts futilely bounced off of Gene's arms and legs before he vanished yet again, this time crashing into his opponent from behind and trying to hold the man's arms behind him as several SHIELD agents, flanked by a SWAT team, descended upon the two. The man in the suit slammed his head back into Gene's, and took the opportunity to wrench himself free, taking off and flying away as fast as he could.

Left alone and unable to follow, Gene was about to teleport out of the area when a SHIELD agent, gun trained on Gene's head, asked him what his name was. Through thinly concealed anger, he responded, "Altanbaatar. And you're welcome, lady."

Then there was a flash of white light, and he vanished.

* * *

In the other room, Tony's holographic AI self watched, confused. It was programmed to act as much like Tony as possible. But while it could make it through the school day for a few periods when needed, new situations tended to baffle the young AI very thoroughly. He still wasn't used to this whole 'living outside the lab' thing, or acting independently. He wished Tony was here. Of course, that was impossible, so the shy artificial being made his way into the back of the class, looking up at the screen as discreetly as possible. He was glad Pepper was too busy looking at the TV to look at him. She was really good at telling the human from the hologram. It made him nervous. Then again, a lot of things made him nervous. Tony might delete him if he found out... or he might do something a lot more painful and lengthy that'd make him wish he was dead. He wasn't the first holographic AI to do this, after all, and he could be replaced.

Watching the way everyone reacted, he tried to look interested. Emotions like this were hard to fake for him, and not just because he was made of hard light. He was just genuinely confused as to why everyone was so excited for a super hero to beat his dad when he knew what was coming if his father lost. Wincing at the thought, he wrapped his arms a little tighter around himself and stared up at the screen, knowing that when Tony got home, he would be furious. And a furious Tony was a sadistic Tony, especially since he didn't particularly care about his AIs much more than he did the dirt beneath his feet. Had he been human the hologram would've shaken in fear. Unable to do that, he instead tried not to let his face show the pure panic that was building up inside, his too-light blue eyes widening as the situation grew rapidly unwinnable.

Phase One of the plan had just gone wrong, and that meant his life was about to become a living hell.


	4. Secrets And Fire

_**Author's Note:**_ And here, we divert from canon to introduce an A:AA universe enemy, since Gene isn't fighting the Tong/Mandarin/Maggia etc. Also, things go wrong. But that's a given in the super hero world.

* * *

_Well, if the episode starts with one of our heroes getting shot through the chest with a shotgun, that's probably a good indicator of how the story's gonna go.__ – _A TV Tropes editor, in reference to an episode of Supernatural.

_No good deed goes unpunished! No act of charity goes unresented! No good deed goes unpunished, that's my new creed!_ – Elphaba, from the musical Wicked

* * *

Gene's legs were killing him.

He wasn't sure if he meant that literally or not as he collapsed onto his bed, the telltale white light of teleportation fading behind him. Pulling down his face mask so he could breathe, he lay flat on his back gasping for air for several long, agonizing minutes as the pain worked its way out of his system, his legs shaking uncontrollably underneath him. His white gloved hands clutched the sheets to keep him from screaming as he lay there burning with fever and immobile with pain. Whoever had decided to put a hood on this outfit was completely insane; he could feel sweat drenching his undershirt – and why, he thought through the dull haze of agony, was there layers on this thing? He struggled to remember how to recall the power back into the Rings, and once he managed it the force of the strength retreating from his body made him collapse entirely. He blacked out for a few seconds, awaking to a spinning room and a headache.

"I hate lasers," he muttered to himself. "And I hate psitanium. Energy sucking nightmare fuel…"

His grumbling was interrupted by Rhodey bursting in via the front door. The Mongolian boy heard his footsteps, followed quickly by his voice. "Gene? Gene, tell me you're here. You weren't at school all day, I was worried, tell me you're-"

"In our room!" Gene yelled at him, to get him to stop panicking. He looked at the wall clock. It turned out what he thought had been several minutes had been hours; he must've passed out without realizing it. _Oh, great, just great,_ he scowled as Rhodey threw open the door, looking terrified. "Calm down, Mommy dearest, I'm okay."

Rhodey looked him over. Gene was sweaty, pale, his legs were shaking, and he had a nasty bruise forming on his forehead, though Rhodey couldn't see underneath the boy's messy hair. "You're not fine. You look like you got hit by a truck."

"Love you too, Rhodes," he shot back dryly. "Where's Tony?"

"In his lab, for right now," Rhodey explained, shifting uneasily. "I don't think he realized that was you we saw on TV. No one at school did, actually, although I'm pretty sure Pepper has founded the Altanbaatar fan club by now."

Gene scrunched up his nose at the thought. Sitting up, he was unable to hide the involuntary flinch at the pain still in his stiff muscles. Teleporting meant a lot of rough impacts and his muscles still hadn't gotten used to not being able to bend at the knees for that. They might never be strong enough for this. Human beings weren't meant to walk that way. Gene met Rhodey's worried gaze and fought the urge to groan. Normally Rhodey would be yelling at him for skipping school. That he wasn't meant he was in full on maternal mode, and though Gene knew he meant well, some part of him resented being taken care of and pitied. Since when was Rhodey Gene's mom when Tony was so much more interesting? No one ever chose to spend time with the normal Stark sibling when the genius was around. Then again, Tony was hidden away in his nerd hole. No rescue in the form of his bumbling brother was forthcoming.

"So," Gene sighed, "Give me the lecture on how I screwed up. It's what you do best, Tony can attest to that, and I'm sure you've got a good speech on the reasons why I suck ready for delivery."

"Actually, you were pretty good out there today. Skipping school is a really bad idea because my mom will have a fit if she finds out, but…" Rhodey looked at him thoughtfully. "You saved a lot of people's lives out there today. Your dad would be really proud."

The Mongolian stared at him, looking genuinely moved. "Rhodey…" He shook his head slightly, clearing away his more emotional thoughts. "There were people down there. Psitanium is toxic and that red guy didn't seem to care who got exposed to it. I couldn't let him hurt anyone. Even if that meant rushing in without even a half assed plan behind me and no clue what my own powers were," he added, a note of self deprecation in his voice. "Did it at least look like I knew what I was doing out there?"

"Since we couldn't see your face under that thing, yeah, actually." Rhodey gave him a solemn look. "I just don't understand the outfit change."

"The Rings did it. We talked. Kind of." Rubbing the back of his neck, a habit Howard Stark had passed on to both his children, Gene sighed. "And now I sound schizophrenic."

"Worthy child, do not speak ill of yourself. It is most unbecoming and unearned."

"Oh my God, I _am_ schizophrenic," he groaned, standing. "Well, this has been a fun year, hasn't it? Maybe next I can find out the Hulk is my father and your dad's a drug dealer, because those are the only two ways my life could get any weirder."

"Enbish, don't you think we owe the boy an explanation? You can't just intrude on people's conversations like this. It's rude." The second voice seemed, Gene thought, to be coming from the green ring Howard had found. "Child of Narangerel, I am Terbish, part of the clan Khan."

"My Rings are talking to me," Gene said, looking horrified. He gave the black boy a solemn look, even through the rising panic in his mind. "Rhodes, I've gone crazy. Take the Rings and make sure I don't do anything psychotic and destructive with them, okay? You're the only one I can trust with this, so promise me you won't use these to cut class or anything else Tony and I would use them for-"

"_Temugin!_ You are not going crazy, we're right here!"The purple Ring flashed powerfully as Gene froze in the middle of taking it off. He looked at Rhodey and mouthed, 'did you see that?' to which Rhodey nodded. "We are the guardians of the Rings you now possess. We are the judges of who is worthy and who is not. We-"

"Are over dramatic and full of ourselves," Terbish finished dryly. Gene chuckled at the green Ring. "We are, however, indeed the judges of how much power you have access to from the Makluan Rings. Since your intentions are to stop the man who puts so many lives in danger, we granted you the form of the protector. It is yours to use so long as you keep your intents pure and your heart free from corruption."

Rhodey stared at the suddenly silent Mongolian boy. "What are they saying?"

"As long as I'm not evil I get to keep the cool clothes and the power. They're just here to pull the plug on me if I go all Johnny the Homicidal Maniac on you." Stretching, Gene shook his head slightly. "Worst job ever if you ask me, but I guess somebody has to do it. Even if it makes me look like a raving lunatic from now on."

"Gene?" Rhodey gently took his arm as the boy swayed on his feet. "You feeling okay?"

"I got my butt handed to me by a man with dual laser blasters and my jewelry is talking to me. I'm as okay as I can possibly be under these circumstances, Rhodes." Gene snorted at the mental image. "I think there's a me-shaped hole in the bakery by the park. We should totally go check that out tomorrow before they fix it."

And to his amusement, both Enbish and Rhodey groaned.

* * *

Voices were in his head.

Life, Gene was learning, was a series of things going wrong. Now his last ounce of privacy had been handed over to two people who resided inside Rings. His mother was right when she said life was never dull, but he was rapidly beginning to miss the days where his biggest issue was finding his missing socks. Presently it was seven in the morning and he was having a mental conversation that was steadily making him more and more convinced he'd never be normal again as long he lived. The clan Khan was not a very mentally stable one, not if these two were any indication. As he got dressed they gave him something akin to a crash course on ancient history. It boiled down to, stripped of Terbish's constant snarky commentary and Enbish's dramatic embellishments, the Mandarin wanting to give the Rings to worthy successors. But they were all unworthy, vicious, backstabbing underhanded power hungry liars. The only person who wasn't like that was Temujin, grandson of the Mandarin… at least until his father was murdered, at which point he became a very different person – Genghis Khan, the original Mongolian badass. He'd had too much on his plate to take on being Mandarin as well.

So now all the Rings were hidden throughout the world with tests of character guarding them. On top of that, there were also spirits guarding them from being used by the wrong people. They were the spirits of the children of the original Mandarin, noble warriors. Fantastic, that meant he would one day know the joy of having five voices in his head at all times. Gene snorted, shaking his head to himself. And he used to think Rhodey's nagging was bad! This situation was, however, a small price to pay for keeping one of the most heavily populated cities in the world safe. Not that New York City had any shortage of super heroes. He'd seen Spider-Man once and he knew Daredevil had the gritty and poor parts of the city covered pretty thoroughly. The problem was that neither of them were laser proof or capable of taking on the villain the media had dubbed Iron Man. Gene had super powers and he barely kept himself from being killed. Iron Man entering the fray was like bringing a laser cannon to a fist fight. And someone who'd mess with psitanium wasn't exactly brimming with concern for everyone else's safety. Gene shuddered at the thought of what those blasts could do to human flesh.

School was awkward. Tony was more shy and socially awkward in the presence of other students than he had been at home. It was almost like he was a different person. Not that Gene himself was any better on that front, having gone from a flirty smart aleck to a more confrontational snarker. He couldn't help it. He was annoyed at the shallow and stupid people around him who spent their days whining about not having the latest shoes or having curfews. At their parents were alive and they hadn't had to switch schools mid semester. Tony's newfound aptitude for talking to teachers even outside of class made sense if this was how stupid their peers were. Gene had thought that perhaps private school might have meant an increase in people's intelligence, not a decrease, but he had never been more wrong.

Entering the kitchen, Gene only half listened to Tony and Rhodey's conversation as he went through the motions of making toast. Enbish was already proving himself a tremendous annoyance, nagging Gene about the nutritional value of what he was eating, and Gene was already learning to tune him out just like everybody else in his life. The only people who he'd ever listened to were gone. Everyone else who gave out advice felt like cheap substitutes for his parents. It was easier to just not listen to anyone and keep doing the few normal things he could do in this life.

"You call her _Nami_?" Rhodey's voice was incredulous, knocking Gene out of his reflective thoughts. "Tony, she's your teacher!"

Tony was oblivious as always. "So?"

The black boy put his face in his hands for a moment. "Tony, people are going to think you _like_ her."

Gene watched in amusement as his brother naively tilted his head and responded, "But I _do_ like her. If I didn't, we wouldn't be friends."

"I meant…" Rhodey sighed deeply. "People are going to think you _like_ like her. Especially since Ms. Asaji is so young and she's not married. Get it?"

The brunette looked completely confused. "No."

"Look," Gene cut in, trying to come to his brother's rescue, "We need to get going if we're going to make it on time. Can you two argue on the way?"

"We're not arguing, Tony is just being dense, as per usual," Rhodey shot back, shaking his head slightly. "I swear it's like he's got all the nice qualities of your dad without any of the social awareness and you got all the social awareness and none of the genius."

Gene couldn't comment on that. He was too busy trying not to gape at Tony, who was cheerfully texting Ms. Asaji about something. In his head, he groaned. Tony was the champion of obliviousness and innocent nerds everywhere, and he wasn't exactly helping his case with Rhodes, either. But Gene had long ago learned that trying to bail Tony out of these situations was beyond hopeless. It wasn't that Tony thought Rhodey was blowing things out of proportion, it was that Tony didn't understand there was anything _to_ blow out of proportion. He'd leave the whole mess to Pepper and Rhodey, who had the needed bluntness and patience respectively to deal with it. He had Iron Man to worry about.

And quite frankly, that was an easier problem to solve than Tony Stark was.

* * *

Iron Man was after psitanium.

Gene was about ready to kill him. Had he not been the son of Howard Stark, sworn pacifist and peace maker honored the world over, Gene would have. Had he not been so thoroughly trounced every time they fought he'd have done it anyway, son of Howard or not. The Rings spirits certainly wanted him to, but the situation was rapidly becoming too complicated for that to be an option. Firstly, psitanium was explosive and toxic, which were two words that did not go well together. Secondly, it was far too easy for Iron Man to grab hostages mid fight and Gene was not about to get a civilian killed with the deaths of his own parents so fresh in his mind. Thirdly he was doing good to balance school and this madness as it was. Teachers were beginning to 'I have to use the bathroom' was code for 'I'm cutting class, be back soon'. Iron Man, however, was active all day every day, and quickly becoming the bane of both SHIELD and the police in general.

All the robberies were weird, all connected to varying minerals of different kinds and technology. Gene freely admitted to Rhodey he didn't have a clue what Iron Man was going after. Normally they'd ask Tony, but that would mean revealing his secret identity to him, something Gene didn't want to have to do unless necessary. The last thing he needed was to get his family involved. It was best for his sake and the Rhodes that Altanbaatar came out of nowhere and was untraceable, and not having the truth known was easier than having people lie. Paranoid as that train of thought was Gene couldn't help fearing for the people around him. Under the circumstances, he explained once to Rhodey, there was such a thing as being properly paranoid.

The saving grace of Altanbaatar was that he wasn't the only super hero working against Iron Man. Not that he knew who the strange black clad shadowy figure that kept going after the man of iron was, but the enemy of his enemy couldn't be all bad. Said person tended to glitch out the cameras and electronic devices of the world around them when they were present, preventing any real photos being taken. Had Gene not known that there was magic to that effect he'd have expected some kind of technology behind it, like the invisibility Iron Man was capable of. Not that he knew which possibility he was dealing with; everything was unclear when it came to New York City. Every weird thing that could happen in the United States always did in NYC. For all he knew it was an unknown third option.

"I hate my life," he told Rhodey one day as they walked home from school. "I wish it involved more normal problems like embarrassing parents and who to ask to the dance and all that crap."

"Although we both know who Tony's taking," Rhodey muttered, shooting the brunette a glare he didn't see because he was texting Ms. Asaji. "Are you two just incapable of being normal?"

"Rhodes, this is the most normal the two of us have ever been. Think about that the next time you complain: it could be worse." Gene smiled as he groaned. "I still think you're over reacting to the whole Ms. Asaji thing. You're just jealous because you're not smart enough to hold a conversation with her for more than a minute and a half."

"Oh, yeah, that's it. I'm _jealous_ of Tony's being a social outcast. Yeah, you've got me there," Rhodey rolled his eyes sarcastically. "Please, like I want to spend twenty minutes after class talking about the pros and cons of free market capitalism? I didn't even think that was Tony's thing." He turned to Tony. "Speaking of which, when _did_ that become your thing?"

"Hmm? What?" Tony looked up from his phone, then stopped walking. "Uh, me and Nami are gonna hang out, so, uh…" he rubbed the back of his neck, awkwardly. "I'll catch up with you guys later, I guess." He winced slightly as Rhodey gave him a disapproving scowl, but didn't say anything else.

Gene grabbed Rhodey's arm, looking stern. "Leave him alone, Rhodes. It's better than having him holed up in the lab all weekend."

"Yeah, but-"

In reflection upon that moment, Gene would wonder how anyone managed to sneak up on two of the most paranoid teenagers in New York. He would fail to recall who was attacked first or which one of them went down earliest. All he'd remember was the horrific smell of chloroform, sharp and biting, and then the world swirling into darkness. He was fairly sure he swore, something vulgar and incoherent, though it could've been Rhodes, or one of the Rings…

The Rings.

Gene woke up with a start and looked around. There were concrete walls, boxes and shipment containers. Low lights blurred his vision as he fought for coherency, not understanding the voices and words around him. Still dizzy from the knock out, it took him a minute to realize that his hands were bound behind his back. That wouldn't have been a problem – he could've teleported out of that – had there not been other people tied to him. He could see Rhodey and a random stranger on the left and right of him respectively, both still unconscious. Looking around carefully, he felt his heart sink when he realized there weren't any exits he could get to even if he did teleport out of here. And let's say he got out of the room, what was waiting for him out there? What was on the roof? What would happen to the people he was tied to? There were too many unknowns for him to make a decision.

Twisting in his bonds when he heard footsteps, he managed to make out both the figure of a fourth bound person and a man he presumed to be their captor. His eyes were cold and evil. His very presence made Gene feel like an alarm inside him had been tripped. He had dark brown hair slicked back, sharp pointed features and tanned skin. Though he couldn't have been any older than Gene himself, there was something very intimidating about him, about the way he eyed the four captives in turn. His eyes locked with Gene's and his lips turned upward in a cruel smile.

"So you're awake." His voice was smooth and silky, his accented English clear and articulate. "I didn't realize when I grabbed you how important you are. Even if everything else falls through, I'm sure I'll get a fantastic ransom for you."

All the Starks had gifts. Howard's was love and generosity. Narangerel had been a fierce and loyal woman. Tony was kind if a little clueless. Gene was an asshole. It was his gift. It could also buy them time for the police to figure out what was going on and get them help. Normally talking back to kidnappers was a very bad idea. Then again, normal people didn't have an inheritance nine digits long. Flicking his head to move his unruly hair out of his face, Gene put on his best nonchalant face and tried to pretend his heart wasn't hammering in his chest and his legs weren't on fire with pain.

"You're an idiot, you know," the Mongolian boy informed him point blank. "Kidnapping has the lowest success rate of any type of crime. Robbery, arson, even murder in broad daylight in front of multiple witnesses would've had a better shot of working than this. That's not even mentioning the abandoned warehouse shtick, which is such a cliché it's the first place police are trained to look in these cases. I give this an hour, two hours tops before I'm back home watching TV and doing my homework."

His captor knelt down to Gene's level, smirking faintly. "Oh, you rich people and your alpha-male showmanship. It never fails to amuse me how your kind tries to pretend that you're on top of everything when you're just trying to buy time. Sad, isn't it, that your private education didn't afford you any real intelligence or originality, hmm?" He stood, his dark blue eyes looking distinctly bright in the dim lighting. "Well, I'm off to make my fortune. Feel free to keep the false bravado going if it helps your fragile self esteem."

"The guy who's walking away the second anyone dares to critique him is making fun of my self esteem? You're the one whose fragile ego couldn't take the solid statistical fact that this wasn't the easiest route to choose," Gene retorted dryly, feeling the ropes that bound him to three other people shift. "Ten bucks says you cry when the police catch you." _That_ made his captor freeze mid-step, fists tightening into balls. "Aww, did the mean captives make fun of your plan? Does baby want his bottle? Does he? Yes he does."

Gene realized he'd gone too far when the boy's hands burst into bright blue flames, the heat so intense that he could feel it from ten feet away. Eyes glowing a sharp electric blue that seemed freakishly inhuman, he rounded on his captive with utter fury written all over his features. The whole room began to grow hot. Then, as quickly as it had come, it stopped, his eyes shutting as he inhaled deeply. He gave Gene one last furious, lingering look as he turned and walked away, out of the other boy's line of sight. Someone had called for him in a language Gene did not understand and whatever the message was took priority over a mouthy captive. Which was good, since Gene could now feel his heartbeat in his entire body.

"That was a very bad idea," a muffled voice from directly behind him said. It wasn't Rhodey, and it wasn't the other person tied to him , since they were both unconscious. The fourth captive had apparently been woken by the fire. "You should not taunt those with greater power than you. What were you hoping to accomplish?"

"Seeing how rational and restrained he was, mostly," Gene explained quietly. "It's like testing the water to see if there are sharks in it. Bad idea, in retrospect." He craned his neck backwards to whisper, "Who are these people and what do they want?"

She moved her head back to try to keep the conversation private, for whatever that was worth. "They talked about luring someone here. We're bait. I couldn't understand anything more than that. It's complicated and my English is not good enough."

_Well, welcome to America,_ Gene thought with a small sigh. _What a fantastic day she must be having._ Out loud, he said softly, "Listen to me, and listen carefully. What's your name?"

"Fadeelah," she whispered back, leaning so that the back of her head just touched Gene's.

"Fadeelah, I'm Altanbaatar." She inhaled sharply, so he knew she recognized the name. "I can get us out of here, but I need your help."

There was a pause as she considered her options, knowing that helping him would be extremely dangerous given that she didn't have any significance to her captors and was therefore expendable. He wouldn't have blamed her for backing out then and there.

"What would you have me do?"

He smiled in spite of the situation. Who said nobility was dead?

* * *

As a kidnapper, there are two stages when things go wrong that one must be aware of.

The kidnapping itself is often the most botched stage of things. After all, detaining someone against their will is harder than it looks. When locked in prison, people could make weapons out of newspaper and burn through the bars of their windows with chili. Human beings are at the core creative and desperation made geniuses out of idiots. Even with a safe place set up to keep them, making sure they didn't escape en route to that place usually took a lot more effort than people thought. The sheer number of ways it could go wrong meant that once the holding area was reached, the kidnappers had a tendency to relax, assuming the worst was over.

It was then that things had the greatest chance of going wrong. The pick up of the money and getting away was actually fairly easy for experienced and dedicated criminals. Their biggest problem was making sure captives didn't go missing, leave the premises, or go completely insane. You will imagine, then, the horror that the pyrokinetic teenager felt when he realized all three of these things had happened simultaneously in under ten minutes.

Rhodey was, to his credit, doing a magnificent job of playing the captive gone mad. This was not exceptionally hard for him; he was ranting at the walls about teachers and respect and boundaries and choco-taco night while blaming all the above on the Illuminati. Gene had vanished. Not escaped, he'd literally vanished and now the last to wake up of the captives was babbling on to her captors about how he was probably an angel of some kind. Said captors weren't sure whether she was just religious, crazy, or both. Meanwhile two of the hired thugs had the unpleasant task of telling their fiery boss that the Muslim girl they'd nabbed off the street had managed to escape by – and their boss made them repeat this to make sure he wasn't hearing things – kicking a guard in the groin, taking off her head scarf and tying his hands together before throwing dirt in the eyes of two others and running off. He stared at them incredulously.

"I don't know what we're paying you, but it's too much," he snapped, giving them a glare as the room began to grow hot again. "Go after her. You lost her, so it's your heads if she goes to the police. Get moving or so help me God I will roast you both alive!"

"Papaya causes cancer!" Rhodey was insisting to a piece of wood as his captor approached. "You don't understand – the world doesn't understand – but it's going to be proven and then you'll all be sorry! You'll see!"

A fireball flickered by Rhodey's head. The next thing he knew improbably hot hands were on his neck, pinning him to a wall and lifting him off his feet. Glowing eyes that seemed to lack pupils bore into him. "Look, you aren't fooling anyone with your pathetic little act, so why don't you start acting like you have the tiniest shred of self preservation before I set you on fire for my own amusement?"

Rhodey nodded, too out of breath to speak.

"Good. Now, listen, little nigger," and he grinned as Rhodey's eyes went wide at the word. "You are expendable cannon fodder. I have no reason to keep you alive. None. You would hardly be my first kill and incineration leaves no evidence behind. The pain of being burned is like nothing else a human being can experience, pure agony so intense you will not even be able to scream. The pain is enough to make your body want to shut down, and yet it also prevents your body from being capable of it, making you one of few human beings who will know what it is like to cross the conscious pain threshold and not pass out. You'll wish you had, however. You will beg me for another dose of flame to end the pain, little nigger, and I will laugh and provide it knowing how much it hurts to beg a man for death. The only reason you are not halfway through this process as we speak is because I think you know how this happened, I want that information so I know who to blame and I enjoy seeing you scared. Keep in mind, though, that there is nothing stopping me from killing everyone in this building and getting away with it, so it is in your best interest not be a smart aleck and lying would be signing your own death warrant. Are we clear on that?"

Rhodey nodded again and the death grip on his neck was released. Heat and pain were all throughout his neck now, making the room spin, but he was given no time to recover as the pyrokinetic reached down, grabbed him by the front of his shirt and hauled him to his feet, eyes blazing. "I thought – I came up with – the plan, well it wasn't really a plan, just some ideas – once I got the ropes undone they were all interwoven like a system, so we all got free more or less at the same time – the guards needed to be distracted-"

"You arrogant little fool, you're twice as stupid as your friend and three times as reckless! I am going to burn off your arms just to watch you scream!" he turned a wicked, heartless grin onto the religious old woman huddling in the corner, who eyes were wide. "And you're going to watch as punishment for helping this pathetic plan along!"

She began to cry, shaking her head as flames emerged from his hands, blue-hot like welders torches. "Oh, God, no, take me instead, please, I'll do anything, let the boy go, it was all my idea-" But he wasn't listening.

Rhodey would never recall, later on, who had saved him. He knew from police reports that there had been two super heroes present, Altanbaatar and the being made of darkness known as Shadow Wisp. He knew that he'd been thinking at the time that Gene wouldn't let this happen, that Gene was going to rescue him, but he remembered clearly the indescribable shock of flame against his chest. He knew he screamed. Then there was light, and on the other side of the room, darkness, and the pyrokinetic dropped the black boy to the floor, a forgotten nameless victim in a sea of them, too unimportant to be finished off. There was a woman's voice telling him it would be alright. He heard Gene say something about taking care of Rhodey, heard someone reply they'd chase Talahamir.

As everything faded to black, Rhodey felt the name etch itself into his memory. Talahamir.

He would never forget.

* * *

Gene had never felt panic like this before.

He'd taken off his deel and wrapped it around Rhodey as the boy's body went into shock, spasming against Gene's grip. Holding him close and feeling like no amount of screaming would ever show his fear, he teleported away. The nearest hospital was too crowded and notoriously bad at service. Gene had a different place in mind, one with a lot better resources: SHIELD's Helicarrier. The floating fortress of doom was staffed with the best doctors and technology in the world, and Gene didn't trust magic for this. Not his own, not when it was so unstable. He didn't even hear Terbish and Enbish screaming at him that it was a bad idea, that he was in over his head as he gathered up all his strength and felt himself vanish and reappear, hitting the metal of the Helicarrier with a dull thud and startling several SHIELD agents into drawing their weapons.

All he could think was, "Please, don't let Rhodey die."

And for all their suspicions and paranoia, SHIELD didn't.


	5. Ice And Damnation

Author's Note: WE HAVE PLOT! The plot is up and running! And I kept the exposition down to bearable levels! It's a miracle! Well, okay, this thing still got way out of hand length wise, but at least there's more dialogue and Gene's getting some character development. As is holo!Tony, who's got a really cute moment in this one. I know you all probably want to see real!Tony, but he's busy being a genius, so he's getting maximum usage out of holo!Tony. Wouldn't you?

Anyway, this chapter's existance does not mean I won't have Blizzard pop up, it just means it'll happen later. Everything that happened to Tony in IM:AA will happen to Gene, just at a different pace and in a different sequence. I originally wanted each chapter to be equal to an episode of the series, but either my chapters are going to be 10k apiece or we'll have to have more chapters than IM:AA had episodes. Maybe both. I don't know at this point.

_

* * *

No phrase summons forth bad luck quite like 'Can it get any worse?'_._ This seems to be God's cue to release the hounds._ – American comedian Dane Cook

_This is not the convenient plot twist that saves our heroes. This is the convenient plot twist that makes them even more screwed. _– Ryan MC, on his comic series Two Mad Scientists

* * *

Altanbaatar was pacing the length of the medical bay.

He'd been specifically told not to, but he had continued to do anyway, circling the bed Rhodey lay on like a hawk. His white undershirt was stained with blood and its hood was faintly charred. He smelled of metal and smoke. When he'd been asked if he required treatment – he certainly wouldn't be the first hero SHIELD had treated – he'd shaken his head and retreated back to a viewing distance, silent and undisruptive. Under his hood there was a thin layer of white fabric covering his mouth, but twitches and frowns were recognizable underneath it. He was worried, that much was clear. He was at great personal risk by staying here for as long as he had; the doctors warned him the Nick Fury would want to talk to him.

"Okay," he'd responded, sounding like he didn't care about that at all. "Just please, save him, he's the only family I have-"

Then the doctor had hushed him and quiet had resumed. There were other patients in the med bay, SHIELD agents who were resting and recovering. Altanbaatar scarcely noticed they were there. His Mongolian boots made faint clicks against the metal surface. Unconscious, the black boy had reached for the deel his friend had wrapped him in once they'd removed it, muttering something that could've been a name or a word. It was currently folded under his head like a pillow. Occasionally, he'd stir in his sleep and lean into it as if the smell calmed him. Most of his torso was burned badly. Altanbaatar had lingered and stared with horrified fascination until told he was blocking their light, hence the nervous pacing. He wrung his gloved hands and sighed repeatedly.

"Where…?" the boy muttered, eyes flickering open. "Altan…?"

The hero was at his side in an instant. "I'm here. It's alright, you're safe."

"The others?" he gasped out through the pain. "Is everyone-"

"Safe, everyone's safe." Altanbaatar reached out and gently pressed a hand to his friend's forehead, frowning when he could feel the heat through the glove. "It's alright, I promise, it's going to be alright. You've got the best doctors in the world working on you. It'll be alright."

As Rhodey back out of consciousness, the door swooshed open. "Where is he?" a voice demanded, sounding distinctly pissed off. "Where's the trespassing psychopath?"

Altanbaatar quirked an eyebrow – which was just about the only facial expression he could make that anyone else would see – and turned to him. "Keep your voice down. This is your hospital."

"You've got a lot of nerve coming here, using _my_ facilities and telling me how to act."

"Nerve implies bravery and forethought. Trust me, Fury, neither of those went into this move," he replied with no small amount of self deprecation. "I assume you're here to tell me you'll be holding Rhodey hostage until I reveal my true identity to you, or you won't treat him unless I become a government registered super hero, or if I don't become a SHIELD lackey, something awful happens to him once you know his real identity, right?"

Now it was Nick Fury's turn to raise his eyebrows. "Is that what the average Mongolian thinks of us?"

"No, it's what the average American thinks of you, specifically. And I'm willing to accept whatever it takes to get my friend out of critical condition, since this was my fault to begin with." He winced, then sighed. "We all have to make deals with the devil every once in a while."

"You can stop the dramatics, now," Fury informed him coldly. "Contrary to whatever the American public has told you, we here at SHIELD do not in fact spend our time kicking puppies, stealing from the poor and kidnapping minors. We obey the same laws as everyone else and that includes the typical laws regarding the medical treatment of people who are onboard the Helicarrier. We're not about to ask you to hand over your firstborn son as payment."

"Enbish will be glad to hear that," Altanbaatar muttered, too quiet to be heard by Fury but loud enough to get a snort out of one doctor.

"What was that, Mongol?" Nick said sharply, and the hero coughed and stood up a little straighter.

"Nothing, sir."

"That's good, because we _do_ have some questions for you, and," he added sharply before Altanbaatar could reply, "_No_, we're not going to do anything to your friend, detain you against your will or fire our laser turrets at old ladies." He paused as his pager went off. "Meet me in the debriefing room in five minutes. We had a ground agent spot you dealing with one our least favorite people, and we'd like the intell." Only Nick Fury could make 'least favorite' into a curse.

"Well," Altanbaatar said to the attending doctor, sounding tired, "That went well. I made myself look paranoid _and_ arrogant all at once. Fantastic. How's Rhodey doing?"

"Mr. Rhodes is going to need skin grafts, which is a procedure we're more than capable of doing here. He's better off with us than at a domestic hospital," the doctor, Ms. Ri, reassured him. "Just go to your briefing. We can handle this, I promise."

"Thank you, doctor. For everything." Altanbaatar turned away, giving his unconscious friend one last lingering look before leaving.

And it could've been a trick of the light, but Ms. Ri could've sworn he was shaking.

* * *

Gene wasn't used to people respecting him.

Normally, he made fun of people indiscriminately and was thus treated as the class clown. He was used to people smiling at him, high fiving him, asking him what was up. As Altanbaatar he was getting used to wide eyed stares since his costume had a way of catching the light and glowing that tended to freak people out a little. Right now, no one was about to fall over in awe of him. These were SHIELD agents, they'd seen things a lot more terrifying and impressive. The thing he couldn't get used to was that they nodded respectfully at him and stood aside to let him pass. There were two agents flanking him, leading him to the debriefing room. They called him sir and looked solemn at the grave. It was then that it occurred to Gene that these people had no idea he was a sixteen year old boy trying to use the power of the Rings to find his father. They thought he was a super hero, an adult, and they were treating this very seriously. That was good, because all the snarky comments and smart aleck remarks he used to throw out were gone. He couldn't find anything to smile about anymore.

Rhodey was a mess. His shirt had caught fire and Gene had just ripped it off rather than unbutton it. While this had probably saved Rhodey's life, it made the damage extremely apparent. The blood was vivid, the skin varying degrees of red, black and charred, and the smell was going to haunt Gene for the rest of his life. He'd cradled Rhodey to him and _felt_ the boy's heartbeat spiral out of control. Too fast, he was going to bleed out, he was breathing too slowly – he hadn't even thought of the ramifications of going to SHIELD. He'd just known that they could save him. He knew he couldn't lose Rhodey. The teleportation's length had cost him a lot of energy, but the pain was worth it to make sure the boy survived this battle.

All his life he'd hidden behind his sense of humor. No matter how bad he felt or how bad a problem was, he would laugh it off. He hid all his insecurities and fear behind laughter and arrogance. And his inability to shut his mouth had almost cost him the only real friend he'd ever had. When Terbish made a joke in his head the raw hostility and hate Gene leveled back at him made both Rings go silent. He was in no mood to laugh. He didn't want to laugh ever again. He was the reason Rhodey was in danger dying, him and his need to taunt and mock everything in front of him, and he wanted to scream in frustration. _What have I done?_ he kept thinking. _My God, what have I done?_ There was no easy answer coming. He met Nick Fury with a somber expression and a curt greeting, hoping that his covered face didn't show how exhausted and defeated he felt.

"Altanbaatar," Nick Fury managed to look perpetually displeased, "How much do you know about what happened down there?" He gestured to the table, which held several video screens. He'd made the news, apparently. And everyone had, in fact, made it out okay.

He exhaled a sigh of relief before saying (mostly) honestly, "I know my friend and three others were kidnapped off the street. They were bait to lure Wisp in. Luckily one of the captives escaped and told me everything, but by the time I got there the man was already attacking the captives. I think his name was Talahamir… He could make fire come out of his hands, and he didn't hesitate to go after his own people when they failed him. Who is he?"

"A terrorist, though of a different kind than you'd expect to find in New York City." Fury's mouth twisted in disdain. "I've never put much stock in all this stuff about magic and psychics, but here's what we know. We know that there do exist pyrokinetics, aquakinetics, terrakinetics and other such people throughout the world, and we know there's a genetic link in their abilities. It's not the same as the X-Gene mutation or anything else we have on record. It's significantly older than that, or so my scientists tell me. Talahamir is a pyrokinetic of Arabic descent. He's spent the last two years committing some of the most horrific massacres and attacks on civilians that we've ever seen."

Gene felt his stomach twist. Pyrokinetic. That meant… well, that meant a lot of things, none of them positive. His friend had been locked in a room with a racist who could make flames burst out of thin air and Gene had been the one who orchestrated it. He paused a moment to pull himself together. Had he known, had he just thought it through, he could've seen this coming. What had he done? He was an idiot and a fool. He didn't deserve his Rings. _Focus,_ Enbish told him gently. _Your friend is safer here than anywhere else in the world._ That this was true, however, didn't help with the fact that it was Gene's fault they were in this mess in the first place. Pyrokinetics were such barbarians, he should have known, shouldn't have left Rhodey with one for even a second…

Apparently, the few inches of skin that were visible on him had paled enough for the female SHIELD agent in the room to notice. "What's wrong?"

"How many black people are there in New York City?" he asked suddenly in reply. "Can you give me a number or a percentage of the general population?"

Nick Fury looked up sharply, eyes narrowed. "And what does _that_ have to do with anything?"

"Black people don't have many… we call them elementals, people who can control varying elements and do magic. In fact, black people have fewer elementals than any other ethnic group on the planet." Gene shifted uneasily. "I don't speak for myself – these are _not_ my views – but there's sort of a tier system, among elementals… not all skin tones are considered equal. Black people are bottom rung in their minds. To a lot of elementals they scarcely qualify as people." He held up his hands and added quickly, "I don't believe that, General Fury. I'm just explaining the culture to you."

"Your culture is sick and twisted," the General shot back angrily. "So what you're saying is, we have racist 'my group is purer than thou' psychopath on the loose in New York City, where there are literally tens of thousands of people he wouldn't care about killing?"

"That's about the size of it," Gene replied, shifting uneasily. "Look, I meant what I said about not believing what he believes. My father was a normal human – I didn't grow up with elementals. Black people took me in when my family died. I live with a black woman right now!" Okay, that sounded _wrong_ and Gene was definitely not telling Rhodey that part when he woke up. "I'm not like Talahamir, I swear. Pyrokinetics aren't like other elementals, for that matter. It's complicated-"

The female SHIELD agent placed a hand on his shoulder, to calm him. "It's alright, we believe you. You wouldn't be here at all if you were racist."

Nick Fury had neither the patience for this tender moment nor the restraint to keep from shouting. "I don't care if you have a black baby mama, you're telling me you let a pyrokinetic madman get away? What were you thinking?"

There was more to the rant than that, a list of complaints and anger. Why didn't any elementals come forth with information? So on and so forth, rational questions mixed with petty complaints. Gene wasn't listening. Across the table from Nick, he was in another world. He was furious. He had done everything he could. He wanted to make snarky remarks, call the other man names and flip him odd before teleporting out of here. But those actions were what had gotten him in such deep trouble. Rhodey was the only human being alive who really knew and understood Gene, and he was going to be scarred for life because of Gene's smart mouth. The urge to fire back at Nick was a knife in his chest, a reminder he was just an arrogant, foolish little child. Enbish had his own list of complaints, equally valid and harsh. All his failures were playing before his eyes like a horrific movie. Slowly the anger turned from being directed at Fury to himself. This was all his fault. All his emotions were getting the people he loved hurt and putting innocent civilians in danger. He was toxic, and everything he did was slowly making the world worse, not better. He had to do something to make this whole mess better. He had to begin making his atonement now before it was too late.

Robotically, he reached out to the table in front of him. State of the art touch screens stared back at him as he pressed the button for the whiteboard application and picked up the stylus. "Are you done yet, Nick?" he asked with a solemnity so heavy it stopped the other man mid sentence. "I want to tell you the secrets of the elementals, how their society works. You'll need to know this if you want to stop Talahamir."

The female SHIELD agent – why was there only one woman in Fury's upper tier? – narrowed her eyes at him. They were a cross between beige and gray, like clay or the earth of dirt roads. He wondered who she reminded him of. He swore, he could almost place her. "None of the other people like you we've talked to were willing to tell us that kind of information."

"Of course not. It's the worst thing any elemental or psychic could ever do," he explained, sounding more stoic and unconcerned with every passing word. It was beginning to freak the agents out just a little. He worked rapidly on his expanding graph, looking calm and thus not like the passionate Altanbaatar the public was used to. Apparently, Nick had hit home with his little rant. "But my mother was already considered a traitor to the magical world for marrying a lowly normal human, and a farmer to boot. I have nothing to lose by helping you. Other people do."

He poked a few key buttons, extending his makeshift graph in greater detail, drawing arrows and creating a tree of sorts. There was a button on the front that said Synchronize. When he pressed it, each view screen got a copy. Fury peered at it and was taken aback. He expected a fairly straight forward conflict. Pyrokinetics, aquakinetics, psychics and magic users were what SHIELD divided the metahumans of the Earth into. This chart had twelve groups clustered under Elemental, _twenty five_ under Psychic, and three under Magic, with over lap and interconnections all over the place. He eagerly scribbled away on his touch screen, adding little details and brief notes that were showing in record time just how vastly they'd misunderstood this situation. _Your mother is rolling in her grave right now, to say nothing of your ancestors,_ Enbish snarled, but Terbish was quietly approving. _If it will help save the people of the world then perhaps this is a necessary evil, Temugin._ They began to argue with each other as he continued to work and sync, work and sync the now monstrously complicated graph. He could feel his stomach turn with the weight of what he was doing. If word of this got out he was never going to live this down. _I guess this is my Super Toaster moment,_ he thought dryly, adding in a few more details.

"If any of you needs a bathroom break or coffee, now would be the time," Gene informed them without a hint of humor to his voice. "And I don't normally indulge, but since I'm going to Hell anyway for this, could someone get me some caffeine?"

Nick Fury actually looked… not quite respectful, but interested enough to stop being confrontational, which for him was like giving out a medal. "You heard the man, Agent Potts. Get Altanbaatar a latté."

The clay eyed female agent stood and nodded. "Sir, yes sir."

That this was not the strangest thing Gene had had happen to him today said a lot about the way his life was going.

* * *

Rhodey felt a hand on his head, and heard a familiar voice whispering to him in a language he didn't understand.

At first he was so weak he couldn't open his eyes. He lay there, feeling his chest constrict and shift painfully with each breath he took. Motionless, thoughtless, all he knew was a voice, a touch and the smell of his house. Soft, something soft was gently being laid on him, something that smelled like home where everything was alright. He relaxed into it reflexively. There was an unfamiliar voice saying something distant and incomprehensible to the black boy as arms gently wrapped around him, lifting him up and cradling him close. There was something about home and doctors. He couldn't think clearly enough to understand, couldn't wake up through the fog in his head. All he could do was slowly open his eyes, blinking in the harsh light up at a being of gold and white that he couldn't identify immediately. He felt more than heard the person holding him say something back to the unfamiliar person, and then there was a flash of swirling lights dancing around him. The next thing he knew, he was in his house, in his own room. The gold mask came away, the hood was shaken off, and Gene stood above him looking broken and guilty.

"I'm so sorry, Rhodey," he whispered as he laid his foster brother on his bed, gingerly laying a blanket over him. "I wish I could make this up to you."

Rhodey closed his eyes, feeling the warmth of Altanbaatar's deel against his skin. "It's okay," he muttered weakly, as Gene hovered over him worriedly. "It's okay Timmy."

Gene flinched as if he'd been struck. "It's been two days since you were knocked out. I got you to SHIELD and they saved you. Your mom should be here to chew me out in a few seconds." He put on his mask and hood, but did not reach for his deel. "How are you feeling?"

"Sore. Sleepy." The black boy yawned. "Glad you're okay." Roberta's footsteps made the Mongolian hero sigh and draw himself to full height. "What're you going to tell my Mom?"

"The truth."

He looked as if he were going to protest this plan, but he couldn't. He didn't have the energy. The slightly younger boy was having a hard enough time keeping his eyes open to watch the ensuing chaos he knew was coming. His friend looked exhausted, his legs shaking a little with either nerves or the remnants of his old injury acting up. Yet he didn't teleport away from his problems, as easy of a solution as that would've been. When the door opened he turned to face Roberta, expression unreadable under the fabric of his costume. At first, even minus the bulky deel, she didn't recognize him. Then he pulled off the mask, pushed down the lower facemask and pulled back the hood. Roberta's expression went from angry to shocked to hurt to something approaching a mixture of all the above with an added measure of sadness. Gene's face was completely blank, eyes betraying no emotion at all. Rhodey shuddered. Was this the same temperamental jerk who reminded his brother of Super Toaster at every opportunity? Was this really the same kid who mouthed off to everyone regardless of rank? Because what Rhodey was seeing was someone different, and not in a good way. Gene looked hopeless, shut down, broken. It was not a pretty sight.

"Roberta, I know that 'I'm sorry' wouldn't even begin to cover this, but… can we talk?" Gene swayed slightly on his feet. "I… I really messed up, this time…"

The next thing he knew he was being embraced tightly, held close like he wasn't the one who'd nearly ruined her family. "Oh, Gene. I'm so glad you're safe."

"This week is just weird," he replied dryly, and for a second there was a spark of the old Gene Stark in his eyes before it was snuffed out and replaced with his newfound soft and stoic voice. "I have a lot of things I need to tell you. Rhodey already knows everything."

She pulled away, holding him at arms' length. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine," he lied, looking distinctly defeated. _By my standards, wanting to throw myself out a window _is_ fine._

* * *

There were certain rules to the super powered part of society.

Every ethnic group and subculture had its own rules and customs. Certain things were different across the globe, but psychics and elementals had a fairly standard system of values across the board. There were cardinal rules to be followed unless you wanted to be ignored and spat upon by every other abnormal person on Earth. Altanbaatar had been active for such a small period of time that he had never been integrated into the underground world of super powered people. He'd never had friends that weren't normal. His life had been spent among average humans and his family, and though Howard Stark was respected among metahumans of all kinds, he was never accepted among the magical community. A clairvoyant had once told him that he had a good heart, he just lacked the ability to understand their world at this point in his life. It was like learning a language: it had to be done early. Gene had some working knowledge of magic and knew the systems and trains of thought behind everything quite well. What he lacked was a presence in the community. So when he broke the most sacred cardinal rule and told normal people the history of super powered humans as they knew it, there was no one to stand up for him and no one to argue for his side of the story.

They were angry. Shadow Wisp, especially, had the gift of radiating raw hot fury despite having everything but her eyes covered. Gene barely had time to identify her before tendrils of shadow shot out of the dark and pinned him to the wall. He could have teleported away, had he not been out looking for her. Maybe it was best to bear the brunt of her fury. He _had_ earned it, after all. She reached up and pulled off his mask to scowl into his eyes for maximum emotion impact, a glare that could've frozen fire. He didn't use any of his normal witty lines, knowing that the way his luck was going that would only make things worse. Still, as the shadowy tentacles wrapped around his legs, he couldn't help thinking he'd seen a porno like this once on the internet. Hopefully there weren't any civilians in this alley, or else they'd be getting some very weird ideas about this right now.

"Traitor!" she snapped, eyes flashing with power. They were xanadu, that rare shade that was part green and part gray depending on the light. With her shadow powers on, they turned dark like storm clouds at night. "I thought you were on my side!"

"I am!" He stared back, rose quartz eyes narrowing. "I don't see how helping SHIELD makes me the bad guy."

"They are normals, sociopaths and monsters to the core," Shadow Wisp shot back, her eyes and the skin between them the only things visible in the blackness of the night. "They start wars, destroy the planet and worship science like it's their god. No good can come of telling them-"

"Oh, and so much good was coming out of not telling them, right?" Altanbaatar scowled. "And your people are just so perfect and flawless, and nobody with powers ever makes mistakes." His voice was dripping with sarcasm. He paused, then shook his head. "My mouth's gotten me into enough trouble, I'm not going to fight with you. You want to turn on me, fine, whatever. Nothing I'm not used to."

"You have turned on your own kind-" she started.

"To save them from self destructing," he replied sharply. "Racist, classist, incomprehensible tier systems of separation are the whole reason people like Talahamir exist in the first place!"

"I thought you said you weren't arguing with me?" Shadow Wisp retorted, quirking an eyebrow.

"Good point. Bye now."

Teleportation was a wonderful gift. Unfortunately, it couldn't get rid of the voices in his head. If only he could just go home, take the Rings off and go to sleep. Then, though, Iron Man wouldn't be stopped, and Gene was one of those people unlucky enough to be cursed with a conscience. Sighing, he pulled his mask back up. Time to go forth and stop the tin man from doing… whatever the heck he was doing. Gene didn't have a clue, SHIELD only had guesses, and even the internet hadn't come up with a theory on what the villain was planning. He'd stolen psitanium, some scrap metal and a pick up truck. Nobody was really sure what the man was going to with such random and unconnected objects. What Gene did know was that psitanium was radioactive, poisonous, and should only be handled by trained professionals who knew what they were doing. He sincerely doubted Iron Man wanted the toxic stuff to cure his grandma's sinuses. Something horrific was being planned, he just knew it.

Patrolling the streets of New York was as good a plan as any. It wasn't like he was some computer genius who could hack into the world's various networks to do good. On that note, Tony had really taken the news his brother was a super hero far too well. What was up with him lately? Altanbaatar frowned, teleporting to a different rooftop and scanning the streets below. Tony had always been a little naïve, but lately it was like he was a five year old all over again. Everything was foreign to him and he was just _different_ in a way Gene couldn't put his finger on. His brother never fought with him or made sarcastic remarks anymore. He hadn't called Gene any annoying nicknames or made any incredibly lame puns. He was turning into someone more calm and quiet. It wasn't like him to be so agreeable. Where was the deadpan snarker who had once woken Gene up at three in the morning screaming that the house was on fire just to pay him back for all his teasing? Where was the techno nerd who couldn't care less about school? Tony was barely recognizable as the same person anymore.

On that note, it totally did not count as spying if Gene just so happened upon Tony during patrol. It wasn't like he'd listened in on Tony's phone call and knew where he'd be and then planned out his circle through the city to go here. No, that wasn't the case at all. The white robed boy crouched in the bushes, pulling back his hood around his ears to listen in better.

"I can't believe you were in my class all this time and I never noticed you," Ms. Asaji was saying, as Tony nervously blushed. "I mean, you'd think I'd have realized a fellow humanitarian after teaching about human rights for three years… But you were so sullen and angry when you first got to class, I guess I didn't see all the good that was under all that grief. I know it must be hard on you, losing your parents like that."

Tony put his hands in his pockets and looked away. "Mostly it's just hard not having anyone to talk to. Rhodey and Gene are getting closer – which is really good, I mean, since Gene's friends all stopped talking to him after what happened – and I'm not saying this is bad but they're not really talking to me – which is okay because that means Gene will be okay but-" He sighed. "I'm rambling, aren't I? Sorry, Nami, I'm no good with emotional stuff. Machines, abstract concepts… That stuff, I get. People are mysteries. Especially me. I don't get me. I think I'm defective."

Nami laughed. "Oh, Tony, don't say that. You're smarter than most adult men I know, and you're big enough to admit your own flaws. And there are worse character defects out there than a little social awkwardness. Just try to remember that you can always call me if you need someone to talk to."

The brunette crinkled his nose for a moment. "I don't think Rhodey likes that I'm hanging out with you. He compared it to you babysitting me, which is probably true."

"No, it's not," she said softly. "Tony, you're a lot more mature than you realize, especially after what you've been through in the past few months. You're not just some kid to me. You're my friend."

Gene, unseen and unnoticed, teleported away. He felt like an ass. He'd been completely ignoring his brother and stealing the boy's best friend. Then he'd almost gotten said best friend killed. His life was beginning to look more and more like just a lengthy list of mistakes. Tony was all the family that he had left and he barely knew him. He was a failure at life, a barely passable hero and a terrible brother. Wisp's words came back to him again: traitor. He'd turned on his own kind. Altanbaatar was a solo superhero and Gene Stark was a lonely person and it was all his own doing at this point. Could anything else go wrong?

Of course it did. In this universe? Please, no words tempt fate harder than those. That phrase was the bringer of doom, and of course doom manifested itself in the form of someone Gene could never fight. Psychic, magical, elemental, normal – everybody generally agreed it was poor form to hurt anyone who was half your height and age. Then again, he _was_ already going to Hell, and she had psychic powers, so perhaps proper etiquette didn't count in this case. He made his way through the smoke and exploding cars to find the source of the madness, even though he'd heard her mental voice several blocks away. God must have had a sense of humor when telepaths were created; they could project thoughts only in their own native language, rendering them incomprehensible to any of their would be rescuers. Gene would've cursed his luck had he not realized that in NYC this was pretty much par for the course. If you were going to run into a foreign minority in the United States, you'd find them in New York City.

An icicle flew past him, ramming into a police officer and piercing his side. Gene swore in Mongolian, grabbed the man and teleported away. "Do you have a cell phone on you?" he asked, and the officer nodded weakly. "Call 911. Don't remove that thing – let the doctors do it." And then he was gone, back into the fray.

"Usifanye hivyo!" the girl was screaming, her psychic powers clearly out of control as an ice storm brewed around her. The snow was so thick Gene could barely see the small form of her body ahead of him. "Msaada!" Her voice turned into a desperate scream at the end.

Gene felt his stomach churn. _It's just a little kid._ He could make out the pose she was in through the waves of cold energy, see her clutching her head and screaming. "Hang on, I'm gonna grab you!" _I hope this works._

He teleported behind her and tackled her. They rolled onto the ground, ice working its way up his arms with unbelievable speed. Several pounds heavier, he focused hard and glared at the Rings. _I know you're angry at me for everything, but don't you dare take it out on an innocent girl! Work, damn it!_ And belatedly, they did. A flash of swirling light later they were sprawled out on the roof of a nearby building, wrestling with each other. She was in hysterics, screaming in agony, clawing at her own head so hard her nails were drawing blood, and through her tears she didn't seem to know Gene was there. In her trashing, however, he spotted the cause of her misery. There was some kind of glowing metal beetle burrowing into her neck. He jumped on the girl, pinning her down with his body weight, and pulled the thing out in one swift movement.

The screaming stopped. She collapsed on the asphalt, shaking and coated in cold sweat. Her pupils were dilated and her hair was a mess. She was of African descent, with dark sepia skin and piercing tawny eyes. He guessed her to be seven, maybe eight at the most. Pocketing the strange device, he tentatively reached out a hand to her. She stared at him for a moment before taking it, and he lifted her into his arms to check her for injuries as his heart rate returned to normal. That had been close, too close, a near disaster. Thankfully she only had some scratches and bruises on her. There were no bodies down below, so he could assume that there'd only been one critical injury. Good. He sighed in relief, looking at her with a mixture of affection and concern. The child's screaming had made him panic like nothing else could. It was Gene's weak spot even when he had hung with the cool crowd. Little kids were fragile and easily killed. At least he'd made it this time.

"Jina lako ni nani?" she asked him, and before he could respond, she continued, "Jina langu ni Shuri."

He wondered vaguely if he'd been this incomprehensible to people back when he only spoke Mongolian. He gestured to himself. "Altanbaatar."

She pointed at herself, smiling. "Shuri!"

"Nice to meet you," he said with a small smile, and shook her hand. "Now, where are your parents…?"

When he teleported down to the ground, she clutched his deel tightly and buried her face in his chest for a moment. Wrapping his arms around her he began to walk through the disaster zone, noting the ice that crackled under his feet. Where had all the water come from? Aquakinetics needed water to freeze and thermokinetics needed there to be moisture in the air. Even water elementals weren't able to pull this kind of snow out of nowhere. He glanced down at the little girl in his arms, who had apologetic tears in her eyes. She began talking rapidly in her language, shaking her head weakly. He shushed her softly, rubbing her back and wishing Pepper were here. She was really good with children from what he'd seen. Had she been here he doubted even the language barrier would've stopped her from bonding with Shuri. He tried to remember what his mother would've done back when he was a child.

"Buuvey, buuvey," he murmured to her, rocking his body slightly and looking around nervously. "Buuvey, bi chamd khairtai, buuvey bi chamd khairtai…" Shuri looked up at him, scrunching up her face in confusion. Even a child could tell the difference between English and Mongolian. He knew two languages and neither was useful for this situation. "Buuvey, tai saikhan baina, buuvey." He stopped and sighed. "Did everybody clear the area or something? Where are your parents? Gah!"

A bright light slammed into him, a spotlight that was blinding even through his mask. He heard a helicopter's motor going, and a voice shouted, "Halt! You are under arrest for assault on the princess of Wakanda! Release her at once or we will add kidnapping to the criminal charges against you!"

Gene groaned. "This is what I get for asking if it could get worse, isn't it?"


	6. Breaking Point

_Often disregarded fact of life: if someone wants to kill you, and doesn't care if they get caught, there is very, _very_ little that can be done to stop them.__ – _TV Tropes Editor

_When a man snaps, it's usually not any one thing that set him off, but rather the culmination of many things over a length of time._ – Rupert Cullingham, author

* * *

"This has officially been the week from hell," Gene muttered to himself as he teleported, the words lost to the vortex. "The gods hate me."

Not that he hadn't earned it. Oh, he'd walked into this willingly and knowingly. Small wonder the universe would throw this at him now. Even before this the spirits hadn't been fond of Gene Stark. One friend, dysfunctional foster family, no biological family and now the Wakandan Guard Force was after him. He'd make some snarky remark about how things could be worse if he wasn't so sure that doing so would trigger something worse. He appeared in a flash of light inside the helicopter, not in the least amused by the guns pointed at him or the glares he was having leveled at him. Shuri wrapped her arms around him as best she could, and said something that made most of the guards stand down, watching him curiously. No matter. The damage was done; Gene was getting used to anger pulsing under his skin like a second blood and when the head WGF agent glared at him the Mongolian boy glared right back, only just barely holding in his tongue. He wanted to make a smart ass comment about not realizing saving lives was a crime, but he was too afraid of making things worse to do so. Hadn't he done enough damage during the Rhodey debacle?

"I would never kidnap anyone, or assault anyone who wasn't armed," he assured the WGF agent who was scowling at him. "Someone or something triggered her cryokinesis. I just got it back under her control."

"Why should I believe that?" the WGF agent said, dark eyes narrowed. "You're a foreigner."

"You're right, I am. I'm from Mongolia, where everything is different. But one thing's universal: logic. I can teleport. If I wanted to kidnap her I could've been halfway across town by now and you'd have no way of following me. Think about it. Why would I come here and debate with you if I wanted to grab her and run?"

"Then why have you not released her?" he demanded evenly.

Altanbaatar spread his arms. Shuri clung to him with hands and feet, nestled up against him like he was her human shield. One of the guards laughed and said something to her Gene didn't understand. Shuri seemed to, gingerly climbing down off of her rescuer and smiling up at him. She reached for his hand and clasped it tightly in both of his. Whatever she said next sent the entire helicopter into peals of laughter. He sighed and turned to the English speaking Wakandan, awaiting an explanation of some sort. The stoic man was struggling not to laugh, smiling with the whitest teeth Gene had ever seen. His skin was warm toned, dark burnt orange like the sky over the city during the sunrise. He didn't seem nearly as confrontational with his gun holstered. For that matter, he had seemed strangely relieved and relaxed once he realized Altanbaatar was not American by birth. For a moment Gene wondered what was going on behind the scenes that had led to this international tension and he made a mental note to go ask Tony later tonight. His brother was an expert on that kind of thing nowadays.

"She says she wants to marry you," the head guard translated, snickering. "What shall I tell her?"

"That that's not legal in the state of New York," Gene replied smoothly._ Oh gods if I get out of this without being shot I swear I won't swear anymore._ He struggled to keep his face stoic. _Paranoid Wakandans aren't as weird as happy ones._

There was a pause as Shuri and the head guard exchanged words. Another round of chuckles emerged. "She says you can move to her home and she'll have her father change the law so you can get married."

Gene smiled in self-deprecation. "She can do a lot better than a poor foreigner who doesn't even have a GED. But I'm flattered anyway." He held out his hand to the guard. "I am Altanbaatar, one of New York City's many resident superheroes. I'm sorry for the misunderstanding. And you are?"

"I am Atsu, leader of the Wakandan Guard Force." He shook Gene's hand firmly, looking solemn. "These are my top agents. We are Lady Shuri's guardians while the royal family visits."

"I see. So, I know why she's here is none of my business, so I just want to ask if you have any idea who hit her with this?" he pulled out the device that had been attached to her. "It seemed to trigger her elemental powers-"

"She is not an elemental!" Atsu snapped, hands curling into fists.

"Yes, she is. Only an ice elemental could've done this-"

"She is thermokinetic and telepathic, nothing else! The royal family is not elemental, they have never been!" Atsu had a glare that might've shut Gene up had he not been in super hero form. It was still nerve shaking and not just a little terrifying. This man was giving him mood whiplash.

"This device has psitanium in it. You know what that does to people," Gene said, growing exasperated. "She's probably elemental _and_ psychic now."

Dead silence fell as all eyes trained on the device and the little girl, who was looking up at him with curious, worried eyes. She didn't understand English. She did not understand what everyone was talking about. Even if she had, she had no comprehension of the enormity behind what was going on. She was going to grow up to be one of the most powerful people on Earth, a rare doubly gifted child, and neither the elemental community nor the psychics would ever quite accept her. Her future was now uncertain at best. Gene cursed himself for not having gotten to her earlier and stopped whatever this was from changing her so radically. He knelt down and brushed a strand of her hair out of her face, watching his latest mistake smile up at him, oblivious to her fate. The gravity of the situation was not entirely lost on her. She reached up to hug him before he pulled away, handing the device to Atsu solemnly. The black man was studying him closely.

"Your people will be better at identifying this thing's origins than me. Good luck." Gene would've smiled, had he not felt so defeated. Ah, well, they wouldn't have seen it through the costume. And even if they had, Gene's smiles were rapidly becoming plastic and false.

He had to get back to Rhodey soon, anyway.

* * *

"Gene, I love you, man, but you're smothering me!" Rhodey half-shouted, drawing the attention of several passerby pedestrians. "You're sleeping on the couch tonight!"

"You never touch me anymore anyway!" Gene retorted, and the black boy froze, an expression of horror on his face. "Oh, come on, Rhodes, you walked right in that one. I thought you said I was being too serious nowadays? You can't have it both ways…" Gene paused, chuckling. "I love my Freudian slips."

"Someone has to," Rhodey replied, shaking his head. "Just tell me why you're going to some hippie New Age magic shop? And why am I going along on this zany scheme?"

"Firstly, Rhodes, this isn't a zany scheme. Super Toaster was a zany scheme. The Dawn Of Two Hundred Llamas was a zany scheme. This is just shopping, so suck it up, because in the odd event either of us gets a girlfriend, we'll have to do a lot more of this." The Mongolian looped him arm through Rhodey's to steady him for the fourth time that block and Rhodey wiggled his arm free for the fourth time, looking annoyed. "To answer those questions in order: I'm going to get some stuff to start climbing my way out of Hell, and you're coming along of your own free will for reasons I cannot fathom. This sure as heck isn't traditional dude stuff, so maybe it's just insanity and the desperate urge to be out of the house and away from your mom."

"Actually, I think it's got more to do with your newfound obsession with Hell than anything else. It's really freaking me out." The black boy sighed as Gene looped his arm through his friend's yet again. "I'm really worried about you. You've been acting weird ever since the plane crash and this isn't helping. You wanna tell me what's up?"

"I told SHIELD about magic, elementals and psychics in great detail. Rhodey, any one of those things is enough to land me in that special part of the afterlife reserved for traitors and liars, _and I did all three_. I need to start working my way out of this as soon as possible." He opened the door to a shop that reeked of incense and led Rhodey in, crinkling his nose at the various smells. "You wouldn't understand, you're not a magic user."

"I'm _trying_ to understand, Gene, I really am. I can't, though, if you won't talk to me. I know we've never been super close but that doesn't mean I don't want to get you through this."

"'Temugin Khan, you're bad for Tony Stark. You start fights, say mean things and make everyone sad. I hate you and wish you'd go away.' That ring any bells, Rhodes?" Gene smirked, but it was self hating and dark, mirthless. Even at five years old, Rhodey had been freakishly perceptive. It was a trait he and his mother had honed to a fine edge with the passing years. "You and I both know I'm toxic. I hurt everyone I care about. And trying to save someone just got me deeper into the hole. You were right. I make everything worse. I'm bad for Tony. So…" he looked thoughtfully at the various unidentifiable objects on the shelves. "I need to make up for everything. This is step one."

"Frog legs are step one?" Rhodey asked, quirking an eyebrow at the assortment of things Gene was grabbing. "Look, I don't know anything about this. You have to fill me in a little more."

He snorted. "Ironic, really. Black people have the strongest magic of any group and you're the clueless one in this equation."

"I though you said-"

"Black people have the fewest _elementals_, Rhodey. There's a big difference between that and magic. Elementals have a lot more sociopaths and insane people among them, for one thing, and for another they only have control of a single element like fire or water. They can't do abstract things like bring luck or curse someone. That's magic. That's where your people shine." Gene grabbed a jar of something that looked suspiciously like blood, and Rhodey tried not to gag as he handed the black teen a shopping basket. "Here, carry this for me, will you? Thanks." He ignored the grossed out expression on his friend's face as he placed a fish skeleton marked at half off into the basket. "Unfortunately magic has rules, and the only reason I didn't lose mine for telling SHIELD is because Enbish and Terbish are letting me keep it. Otherwise I'd probably have been struck dead. It's happened, you know, or at least, that's what they say. You tell the normals everything and the next thing you know you spontaneously combust."

"And what do green, sparkly rocks have to do with your immortal soul?" Rhodey was still lost, although things were slowly beginning to make a little more sense.

"I crossed a lot of lines. I have to make up for it. Lots of blessings for people who aren't me will help, lots of good energy towards the general masses, and I'll probably put up every magical guard I can around the house, so that it's obvious I'm at least trying not to go to the pit of darkness." He tried to make it sound like it was no big deal, but Gene hadn't been able to muster up his cool guy apathy for days now. Every word he spoke resounded with defeat and resignation instead.

"The pit of what?"

Gene's face fell. "It's where traitors go. Everything's dark and silent. There's nothing there, no one to hurt, and you drift through it forever and ever until the end of time. What I've done is treason. I wasn't thinking it through. But I just… I can't lose anymore people, Rhodey. I'm not like you and Tony, I don't cope well with this stuff. I'm weak. So I told them everything I know. Now I have to earn back my soul piece by piece, pay back the universe for my sins. It's complicated."

"It's insane." Rhodey gave him a look that told him that the other boy was in full mother hen mode. "You're telling me that for trying to end a big complicated civil war among your people, you're going to rot in a void for all eternity?"

The Mongolian boy nodded, his shaggy hair falling into his eyes as he did so. He brushed it back habitually, and looked at the basket for a moment before apparently deciding they had enough for his various myriad activities. The dim lighting and incense were giving Rhodey a headache, too, though it might've been the simple absurdity of the magic religion. He sighed, watching his friend look over a selection of luck talismans with uncharacteristic seriousness. Gene wasn't nearly as light hearted as he used to be. Maybe it was that part of it was an act, and he'd always felt like this, but if anything that made it worse. No one should have to go through all this on his own. Gene, though, was stubborn enough to try acting as if he were completely okay in front of everyone at all times. Only someone who lived with him and watched closely could see the stress showing through on the taller boy's face. His eyes had rings under them, he was getting thinner all the time and he was out an awful lot at night. To say Rhodey was worried was an understatement. Add in this religious mumbo jumbo and he was seriously contemplating calling some kind of help hotline on Gene's behalf. He wondered if Gene really believed all of this stuff, or if it was just some desperate attempt to cling to Narangerel's religion in her absence.

"You need one of these," Gene stated flatly, looking at the good luck charms. "And no arguing, Rhodes. You play team mom to Tony and I constantly. You deserve something nice. Maybe it'll be a conversation piece and you'll get a girlfriend."

"No good luck charm is _that_ powerful," Rhodey said with a sigh. "Nobody wants the history nerd. But I appreciate the offer."

"Take one anyway, Rhodey. I already tricked your mom into one and Tony… Tony doesn't exactly need luck with women right now." Under his breath, Gene added, "I can't believe that he's going to The Daily Show with Ms. Asaji… he wonders where people get the idea they're dating from…"

"Tony's oblivious like that. It's a gift of his." He scanned the rows of various rocks, gems and random bundles. "That blue stone. I want that. It's just… it's way cooler than anything else here." He saw the price tag and winced. "I'll pay you back once we get home."

"No need. Tony and I are richer than most foreign countries, remember?" There was a hint of the old snarky man Rhodey used to hang out with in Gene's voice. It was immediately replaced with Gene's newfound constant companion, bitterness. "Not that it's helped us any. "

Rhodey sighed, but he knew better than to keep emotionally reaching out to Gene. He kept trying and the other boy kept growing more and more strange and depressed.

Some people just wouldn't be helped.

* * *

Gene began having nightmares.

He saw his mother, her black hair undone and wild, blood and filth caking her, screaming as she was overtaken by monsters he could not fight. All the power of the Rings could not save her. She died pleading for him to do something. Her blood was bright as the sunset, eyes shining like gems as her pale hands reached out for him, desperate and dying. He awoke in a cold sweat every time. Going back to sleep would only mean more nightmares. Sometimes it was Shuri who was dying, her own power eating her, killing her, and he couldn't shake her out of it. Her tears were icy and stuck to her cheeks as she took him down with her. She was so young, so alone, that he couldn't leave her even as he knew the fight was lost. Worst of all were the nightmares of Talahamir and his flames eating away at Rhodey, whose anguished gasps of pain haunted Gene every time he laid his head down on the pillow. He saw the dark flesh pop and sizzle, red blossoming forth and pain breaking through all sentient thought, watched in horror as Rhodey dropped to the floor, unable to keep living in the face of the madness. He dreamed of Roberta, lost somewhere in a labyrinth with a monster who always found her before he could. He dreamed of Tony's lifeless body sprawled out in front of him. He could never wake Tony up.

Enbish and Terbish were making matters worse, talking, always criticizing. Not good enough, not honorable enough, shameless, traitor, liar, deceiver, whispered Enbish, angry and getting angrier. He had been a handsome man in life, a face shaped like a heart, hair that was black yet gold in the sunlight, eyes like bistre flames that could tear a man apart in minutes. Terbish was worse, though, a scholar who was weak and thin, sickly, childish with his big dark gray eyes and perpetually messy hair. His voice was always in Gene's ear trying to make him laugh, which was what made it so hard when someone so light became so dark and depressed. Try harder, people are dying, they need you out there, everyone is in danger, need to do more, this isn't as important as the big picture, Terbish begged him. The voices were constant presences in his life. They were making it hard just to be alive. But they were right. He was failing. He wasn't doing enough. He needed all the Rings to do this, to make the world a better place, because what he was doing right now hadn't even made a dent in the crime rate in New York City let alone the world. All the information he'd given Nick Fury hadn't been enough to stop the world from falling apart.

"Going through this life, looking for angels, people passing by, looking for angels…"

Ugh, Pepper and that stupid MP3 player of hers. He hated it when she sang at lunch. Unfortunately, when he'd tried to go eat on the roof where things were less crazy he'd found that spot occupied by Ms. Asaji and Tony. They were engrossed in their discussion about a new strain of rabies that was spreading throughout Africa and the response varying governments. Best not to interrupt them. This was how he found himself sandwiched between Happy Hogan and Pepper. Happy was his usual cheerful if oblivious self, pleased to have gotten into a cool school with lots of cute girls. Gene might have remarked, 'for certain values of cute' if he'd only had the motivation within him to do so. Lately he just wanted to ditch this life altogether and work on finding the Rings. Iron Man had stolen a shipment of green psitanium that was the only know cure for two specific kinds of cancer. Most of the patients were not going to make it to the next shipment. Life was spiraling downward and Gene was about ready to snap.

And the worst part was that his mundane life, life at school, should have been making him happy. He had friends, didn't he? He had passing grades and there was a girl in his science class with a crush on him. He should've been happy. So why did he just want to stop existing? He wanted to leave this all behind and be nothing more than Altanbaatar. Altanbaatar didn't have friends who could be put in danger or people who meant something to him personally. Gene Stark was worthless, a washed out nobody who used to be famous and popular in a life that barely seemed like it could've been his anymore. Gene Stark had confidence, style, was always ready to make jokes, had no problems whatsoever beyond who to ask to the dance. He wasn't that person anymore. He was at a table with geeks, losers, cool losers like Pepper, and Happy, who was oblivious to high school cliques and etiquette. How had his life flipped upside down like this so rapidly?

"I heard there's an angel here in New York!" Happy chirped excitedly. "He's blond and he's got white wings. He saved a bunch of people from the Gray Gang!"

"That's not true," Gene said dismissively, prodding at his lunch disinterestedly. He'd gulped down his milk and then withdrawn into his own thoughts. Pepper gave him a strange look.

"Gosh, Gene, you sure are negative lately. What makes you think there couldn't be angels? I mean, we live in such a weird world as it is that if anything this seems way more normal than half the stuff I read on my dad's hard drive…" Pepper said it all in one breath. That was impressive and disturbing at the same time. How did anyone manage to have that much energy all the time?

"Nothing good like that ever happens. It always turns out to be a hoax. Anything too good to be true is, Potts," he replied, dully poking at his sandwich. "Besides, mythology about winged people is old and from all over the world. He could be a bunch of different things. Did anyone get a really clear look at his wings, enough to tell the radius and the density of the feathers? That's the telling factor."

"Oh oh oh!" the flame haired girl gasped suddenly. "What if he's an angel with wings who's trying to study human behavior? I read this one book-"

Gene tuned her out. He just watched her, her boundless energy and enthusiasm. She was full of life, truly alive and filled with potential. She could be anything she wanted to be, he was sure of it. If most people attempted anything with half her energy they'd see immediate improvement. Yet she was still in the city of insanity and danger, the place where everything that could go wrong did – New York City. When monsters attacked, elementals went insane or gangs formed it was always in this place. New York City had untold opportunities and equal if not greater amounts of sorrow and senseless violence, criminals, madmen, sadistic bullies on every level. He thought of Talahamir, of the flames so hot they were blue. Would Pepper ever get to see her dreams come true, graduate high school and go off to do something in criminal justice? Would Happy ever get to be a pro basketball star like he wanted? Or would all these dealings in psitanium and toxic materials kill the public, including them, the innocent bystanders who didn't know what hit them? Would they one day be charred skeletons in their coffins, struck down in their prime by a pyrokinetic who their lives were worth less than nothing to in his eyes? He wanted to know everything would be alright, that Pepper would get her criminal justice degree and the kickboxing lessons she was so keen on and become a SHIELD agent. One day he wanted to see her in uniform doing what she loved. She'd make a good jetpack pilot. And one day he wanted to turn on the TV and see everyone talking about Happy, the last good jock on the planet.

He wanted to believe in angels, too.

But what he wanted and what reality was were very different things.

* * *

There were some phone calls that Gene knew from the onset were going to be bad news.

This included pretty much every phone call his brother had ever made to him, private cell phone to private cell phone. If Tony was calling from home or someone else's house it wouldn't be bad. If Tony was on his phone and was calling the Rhodes' house number it'd be fine. The problems in life only occurred in a direct connection. A direct connection meant Super Toaster had gone critical and breadcrumbs were now raining down upon the Earth or that llamas were parading through the lobby of Stark International and the employees were panicking. When Tony vanished for a class period Gene thought he might be skipping. Instead he got the dreaded phone call, and groaned, sinking down into his seat. This was not going to be good.

"Mister Stark, I remind you that cell phones are not allowed in class unless it's an emergency," Ms. Asaji said, with no real malice in her voice. If anything, there was concern in her teal eyes. "However, I do remember the office saying something about your paperwork being incorrect, so it could just be they dialed what they thought was your home number and got you instead."

"No such luck. It's Tony. Ma'am, I really need to take this, may I be excused?" Gene asked with his best 'I am in no way freaking out I can totally handle this' face.

"Yes you may. Just be sure to come back in and grab your things if you need to leave," she added kindly, turning back to her lecture. "Now, who here can tell me the language of majority in Wakanda? This is going to be on your test, people."

"Tony, what-"

"You have to come get me! Iron Man is high and he's attacking the book store on Fillmore Avenue!"

There was a pause as Gene processed these two sentences, the first mundane and the second sounding like a bad very special episode of a TV show. "Anthony Edward Stark, if this is a prank I swear I'm going to-"

A huge booming noise sounded in the background, followed by screams and the sound of someone yelling 'get down'. Tony's voice was low and desperate. "This isn't a prank. He's all hopped up on psitanium and I can't even make sense of what he's saying and – there's a lot of people here, we can't get past him, he's blocking the door. Please, please come kick his butt? I never ask you for anything! You can borrow my laser weasel!"

It amazed Gene how much like a whining child his brother could sound like. "I'm on it – wait, didn't SHIELD tell you to terminate all the laser weasels? I mean, after the whole debacle at the White House Correspondent's Dinner-"

"We can talk about it later!" Tony half-shouted, growing angry. "And I said I was sorry about that!"

As he hung up, Gene wasn't sure whether to laugh or groan in sheer frustration. He settled for both a smile and a sigh as he teleported away, wondering vaguely what the heck you fed a weasel with laser eyes and how one would go about taking it to the vet. Whatever. He'd let Tony explain the existence of the weaponized animal to Roberta. This was not his problem and quite frankly the surrealism of having to fight Iron Man while he was high was still sinking in. _At least that explains where the psitanium is going,_ Terbish quipped helpfully. _You youth and your drugs. Your ancestors just dabbled in opium from time to time, and we thought that was great. But no, your generation had to come up with super drugs and intravenously injected alcohol, because milk-win and opium just aren't good enough_- Gene tuned him out after this point, partially since he didn't need a distraction and partially since there was no arguing with eight hundred year old spirits about the modern world. They'd either whine that they were his elders and should be respected or they'd be confused what everyday objects were. Thankfully he just needed their power, not their technological prowess.

It took five teleports to find his way to the book store, at which point he was immediately knocked off his feet and found himself suspended in mid-air, deel clutched tightly in Iron Man's hands. His ragged breathing could be heard through the metal of his armor.

"Who are you?" Iron Man roared. "I know you, I know I do! Talk, you Assassin's Creed wannabe!"

Altanbaatar raised his hand and fired a blast that dislodged him from his opponent's grip. In a flash he was on a nearby rooftop, firing off blasts of energy at his red and gold target. Though the blasts hit and were doing damage, Iron Man simple turned and watched him with remarkable calm. Occasionally his legs or arms would give the telltale violent twitch of a psitanium high, as if the breathing weren't an obvious giveaway. In a flash, the metal man dove at the white clad hero, who only just managed to jump out of the way allowing Iron Man to crash into the asphalt. He skidded on the rooftop before rounding with superhuman reflexes and pouncing on Altanbaatar, grip steely and harsh on the man's shoulders as they slammed into the ground. Gene swore he could feel the bruises forming under the vicegrip his opponent had on him, but there was no time to move or think, just teleport. Before he could even take in where he'd landed, Iron Man was crashing into him again, throwing him to the ground with dizzying strength. He was just struggling to get up when a hand gripped his deel and yanked him back so hard it took his breath away. He found himself eye to eye with Iron Man. His head was hurting, his knees were practically on fire with pain, and his nose was bleeding, and all he could think was that he couldn't let his identity be compromised or he'd lose everyone he had left.

He raised his arms and blasted at Iron Man's face, knowing the eyes were the armor's weak point, and he didn't care if he killed the other man in the process. He didn't care if the heat baked the human under the red and gold alive. He would not let any harm come to the people he had left. Innocent human beings were in the balance, civilians, mothers, fathers, people with families and friends, whose death would create voids that could never be filled. Did Iron Man have a family? Friends? Probably, but he was a cruel and callous man. He needed to be stopped. One life versus hundreds, potentially thousands in the long run. It wasn't a hard choice to make; it wasn't even a conscious decision. Altanbaatar raised his hand and let the energy flow out of the Rings and into the target, unaware of the world outside this one moment. He heard a scream, not realizing it was Iron Man's, and he heard someone in the background yell for him to stop. He didn't. Iron Man had to fly away to avoid the concentrated beam. His jets were incredibly fast even though his armor couldn't possibly be at full power after that blow.

Altanbaatar crashed into him, teleporting onto the unsuspecting and surprised thief, who tumbled off course and into the ground. They left a skid mark forty feet long and nearly six inches deep. The impact made Gene want to hurl, if he'd only had enough lunch to do so. All that mattered, though, was that he seemed to have knocked Iron Man unconscious. He raised his right hand, Rings glowing.

"It's time to end this," Gene whispered grimly. "Uuchlaarai, Iron Man."


End file.
